CALIFORNIA – Workers’ rights organisations and advocates have launched a new campaign to pass the Garment Workers Protection Act (SB 62) next year, after the proposals failed to come up for a vote before this year’s deadline in September.
The bill, which centres on scrapping the piece-rate pay system, has been reintroduced by Senator Maria Elena Durazo and Assembly Members Lorena Gonzalez and Ash Kalra – and has garnered the backing of workers’ rights organisations including Remake, the Garment Worker Center (GWC) and the California Labor Confederation (CLC).
“There is never an excuse to deny working people basic rights under the law, but it's especially important to protect workers now as a pandemic and recession create the perfect storm for widespread exploitation,” said the CLC’s legislative advocate, Mitch Steiger.
