The proposal to amend the Shop and Office Workers (Regularization of Service and Wages) Act No. 19 of 1954 to enable women in IT-based jobs to work on international hours and work at night submitted by Manusha Nanayakkara, Minister of Labor and Foreign Employment has been approved by the cabinet.
Accordingly, the legal restrictions on working at night have been revised for employees working in IT-based businesses, knowledge and business process outsourcing organizations, offices that conduct accounts, and administrative and technical work of business organizations located abroad. Thereby, female workers who have completed the age of eighteen years in the above-mentioned fields can be employed before 6.00 am or after 6.00 pm.
In the existing legal situation, a woman over the age of eighteen was allowed to work until 8:00 pm, and there was a limited space to work at night only in a limited range such as airports, hotels, restaurants, and clubs. This will remove the legal obstacles in the labor law to the employment of women workers at night, and it is also expected that the participation of women in the workforce in this country will further grow.
