Protection of labor rights of medical workers by trade unions in the Republic of Kazakhstan

Abstract

The article covers the practical activities of a number of Kazakhstani sectoral trade unions of healthcare workers to protect the social and labor rights of medical workers. Once the activities of these trade unions were studies, the authors drew attention that in recent years they are guided by international standards, conclude contracts for implementation of various projects with the International Labor Organization (ILO), which not only determines ways to build the potential of trade unions and stimulate social dialogue in the field of health, but also shows shortcomings in the activities of trade unions and offers effective measures to prevent them in the future. At the initiative of the trade unions of the industry, now Kazakhstan intends to ratify a number of ILO conventions with essential value for healthcare development. Some attention is paid to the activities of trade unions during COVID-19 pandemic, in particular to the protection of medical workers serving patients with covid infection and who did not receive the lump-sum payments for this. The article includes positive experience of trade unions that developed “Memo on legal protection of healthcare workers”, organized the activities of the group of lawyers “Medical Lawyer”, “Salary calculator”. It analyzed individual and collective complaints received by the trade union, mainly concerning non-reflection of provisions of the Sectoral Agreement for 2020–2022 in the collective agreements of medical institutions regarding the establishment of increased official salaries, increased surcharges for certain categories of medical workers. It is noted that in the whole country, there is unserious attitude of employers not only to the drafting of the content of collective agreements, but also to the conclusion, extension of their validity, additions and changes due to various socio-economic factors, changes in labor legislation.