Observation on submission to competent authorities (CEACR) - adopted 2025, published 114th ILC session (2026)

Lebanon

Serious failure to submit. The Committee notes the detailed information provided by the Government to the Conference Committee on the Application of Standards in June 2025, indicating that the main challenges it faces in fulfilling its constitutional obligation of submission include force majeure reasons (the 2024 conflict) and misinterpretation by officials at the Council of Ministers – the authority competent to submit the instruments to the Parliament – regarding the requirements of the constitutional obligation of submission, as they considered that there is always a need to study the examined Conventions for the purpose of ratification.

In this respect, the Committee wishes to once again recall that the obligation of ILO Member States to submit the instruments adopted by the Conference to the competent authority needs to be differentiated from the act of ratification. The objective of submission to competent authority is twofold: (1) to bring the instruments adopted by the Conference to the knowledge of the public through their submission to a competent authority, usually a parliamentary or deliberative body, and (2) to encourage their ratification or application. Although one of the purposes of submission is to encourage the ratification of Conventions, it does not create any obligation to propose ratification, apply the instruments, or take any specific action. According to article 19 of the ILO Constitution, Member States are entirely free to decide what kind of proposals, if any, they wish to make when submitting the instruments (2005 Memorandum, Part III(b)). The Committee therefore requests once again that the Government provide information on the submission of the Violence and Harassment Convention (No. 190) and Recommendation (No. 206), 2019, the Safe and Healthy Working Environment (Consequential Amendments) Convention (No. 191) and Recommendation (No. 207), 2023, and the Quality Apprenticeships Recommendation, 2023 (No. 208). It also reiterates its request to the Government to indicate the date on which instruments adopted by the Conference at its 99th, 100th, 101st, 103rd, 104th and 106th Sessions (2010–17) were submitted to the National Assembly (Majlis Al-Nawab).

Lastly, noting that the Government has requested ILO technical assistance, particularly in the form of capacity-building activities on the constitutional obligation of submission for officers at the General Secretariat of the Council of Ministers and the Parliament, the Committee trusts that the requested technical assistance will take place as soon as possible.