The Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC) on Wednesday held a lecture on promoting employment through improving China's legal system.

China's top legislator Wu Bangguo presided over the lecture.

Mo Rong, Deputy Director of the Institute for Labor Studies under the Ministry of Labor and Social Security, gave the lecture to the lawmakers.

Although some achievements have been made in employment since the country's reform and opening-up drive, China still faces "serious employment situation" in a long period, Mo said, adding that supply of labor force will exceed demand in a long time.

"A large number of rural redundant labor force, laid-off workers and newly-emerged labor force, such as university graduates, make employment issue more outstanding," Mo said.

He held that legislation is an important method which is widely used by other countries to enhance employment. Enacting employment promotion law will help nail down government's responsibilities in expanding employment and help establish a unified labor force market to provide equal job opportunities for all kinds of job seekers.

The draft employment promotion law was submitted to the just-concluded 26th session of the NPC Standing Committee for first reading.

The draft law says China will implement coordinated employment policies in both urban and rural areas, so as to provide equal employment opportunities for the labor force.

The draft law prohibits discrimination against job seekers for their backgrounds of ethnicity, race, gender, religious belief, age, or physical disability.

The draft law requires governments above the county level to establish an early warning system to prevent, regulate and control possible cases of large-scale unemployment.

The NPC Standing Committee on Wednesday announced that the draft would be released in full text to public after the conclusion of the fifth annual session of the Tenth NPC, so as to fully solicit opinions from ordinary people.

Source: Xinhua