Labor policy panel approves expanded flexible work hour scheme

SEOUL, Oct. 11 (Yonhap) -- South Korea's presidential advisory body on labor policy on Friday approved a proposal to expand the application of the flexible work hour scheme to ease employers' burden from the 52-hour workweek system enforced last year. The Economic, Social and Labor Council convened its plenary meeting for the first time in seven months. Fifteen members of the currently 16-member Plenary Committee, the top decision-making body, participated in the session, while its last two plenary meetings in March were marred by a boycott by three labor side members. The plenary session approved a proposal by its working hour reform committee to give employers greater leeway in operating the 52-hour workweek, which came into force in July 2018. In February, the labor and management sides of the panel hammered out the proposal, which calls for expanding the application period of the flexible work hour system, which allows companies to adjust working hours of employees in a lump-sum manner, to six months from the current three months. It has since been pending, as labor side members of the Plenary Committee refused to attend the sessions. "Following the Plenary Committee's passage of the proposal for the improvement of the flexible work hour system, the council will send it to the National Assembly and urge the legislation based on the proposal," the council said. The committee also approved 12 other proposals related to the establishment and extension of subcommittees. The council was launched in late November, replacing the former tripartite commission of the government, management and labor. But it has been hamstrung by labor groups' refusal in protest of the Moon Jae-in administration's labor policies. jjhwang@yna.co.kr (END)