Grassroots movement Jerit today lodged its 111th police report against Human Resources Minister Dr Fong Chan Onn and his deputy Abdul Rahman Bakar.

The reports are to stop the duo from making amendments to the Industrial Relations Act (IRA) and Trades Unions Act (TUA).

Today's report was lodged at the Dang Wangi district police headquarters in Kuala Lumpur.

Speaking to a group of 20 people who had gathered outside the police headquarters, Parti Sosialis Malaysia (PSM) pro tem treasurer A Sivarajan said Jerit began lodging reports against the duo since three weeks ago.

"We have lodged police reports against them throughout the peninsular and hope that (federal police headquarters) Bukit Aman will take action," he said.

Sivarajan said the proposed amendments to the IRA and the TUA will only victimise workers further and that is why both Fong and Abdul Rahman must be stopped.

Both the IRA and the TUA have been passed at the Dewan Rakyat and is awaiting debate at the Dewan Negara before the amendments are legislated.

Siding the employers

"We submitted a memorandum to him (Fong) on Aug 22 and sought an audience with them but there has been no response, nor did they indicate that the workers' demands will be looked into," said Sivarajan.

One of the amendments to the IRA is the non-automatic recognition to newly formed unions and that the unions must submit a written appeal to the Industrial Relations Department (IRD) for further action if their employers do not respond within 21 days.

However, if it fails to submit a written appeal within a 14-day period, the union will not be recognised by the IRD..

According to Sivarajan, such amendments side the employers instead of the employees.

He then cited the example of how a furniture company, Dekor Panel Emas, in Rawang, Selangor, had allegedly employed various intimidation tactics against employees known to be involved in unions.

He claimed that the president of the company's workers union, R Saravanan, was sacked last June because of his involvement in the union.

Saravanan, who was present at the police headquarters, told reporters that he was sacked for taking leave to attend a friend's funeral.

"Before we formed the union, the company would automatically approve of our absence if we can produce a death certificate as evidence, but now they say it's only applicable if it is the death of an immediate family member," he said.

He claimed that the management only issued a memo to inform the workers of the change in policy after he was sacked.

"I have worked there for eight years and none of the mentioned incidents ever occurred. After we formed our union in September, I received several warning letters for ridiculous reasons prior to my sacking," he lamented.

He also said that the company had allegedly issued him with a show cause letter for going to the toilet for 10 minutes.

"What kind of policy is this? We must stop the amendments so employers will not be given further powers as even with the current powers that they have, they display it with arrogance," he said.