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Deputies call for guarantee of jobs for migrant workers

By Cao Li (China Daily)
Updated: 2009-02-04 07:42

The Shanghai municipal government should set aside certain employment vacancies for migrant job seekers after the Spring Festival holiday, three migrant worker deputies to the city's people's congress suggested.

With the worldwide financial crisis showing no signs of slowing down, migrant workers returning home are worried about losing their jobs after coming back from the holiday, according to Zhang Xiongwei, Hong Gang and Pan Aifang, the three people elected to represent the city's five million migrant workers before the local legislative body.

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"The government should do something to make them go home happily and come back with a hope (to find a job). Migrant workers make a huge contribution to Shanghai's fast development," Zhang said.

The deputies said some vacancies at construction projects of infrastructure facilities and at services in which the government pays to take care of the old, poor and sick should be set aside for them.

The government should include unemployed migrant workers in the city's reemployment services system, in which the government trains and helps the unemployed find jobs, they added.

"I also suggest the government take measures to ensure a stable job market and prevent companies from taking advantage of the crisis to lay off employees," Zhang said.

In the annual sessions of Shanghai Municipal People's Congress last month, Mayor Han Zheng said migrant workers, white-collar workers and university graduates face the most difficulty in securing employment, and more efforts should be made.

He said the government would subsidize companies to maintain full employment, help train the unemployed and provide better services and more loans for people to start their own businesses.

The three deputies said they have not seen a large amount of migrant workers being laid off in Shanghai. "But the worst time has not come yet," Zhang said.