Devestating to family farms, and entry level farm workers, Labor Department Seeks New Rules To Restrict Use of Young Farm Workers BUT Labor Dept. Confirms: It Will Ensure Illegal Aliens Get Paid Legal Wages in U.S. Jobs

Wednesday, August 31, 2011
By Fred Lucas

U.S. Labor Secretary Hilda Solis (AP File Photo)

(CNSNews.com) – The U.S. Department of Labor is seeking to update child labor laws to put more restrictions on farm workers under the age of 18 from working with manure, pesticides, driving tractors and engaging in certain other agricultural activities.
Department officials made the announcement on Wednesday during a conference call with reporters.
Public comment for the regulations is open until Nov. 1 of this year. The rules have not been updated since 1970, Labor Secretary Hilda Solis said during the call. The current rules under the Fair Labor Standards Act already prohibit young workers from certain tasks.
“Children employed in agriculture are some of the most vulnerable workers in America,” Solis said. “Ensuring their welfare is a priority of the department, and this proposal is another element of our comprehensive approach.”

(AP Photo/Jeffrey Collins)

Exemptions would be made under the proposed rules for children who work on farms owned by their parents.
The strengthened child labor rules, which would be enforced by the department’s Wage and Hour Division, would bar agricultural work with pesticide handling, timber operations, manure pits and storage bins. Farm workers under the age of 16 would not be allowed to participate in working on tobacco. This would include cultivation, harvesting and curing tobacco.

The rules are also designed to stop anyone below the age of 18 from being employed in the storing, marketing and transporting of farm product raw materials. Prohibited places of employment would include country grain elevators, grain bins, and grain silos, feed lots, stockyards, livestock exchanges and livestock auctions.

Further, farm workers under the age of 16 would be banned from using all power-driven equipment, including tractors, with an exemption for student learners.

Labor Dept. Confirms: It Will Ensure Illegal Aliens Get Paid Legal Wages in U.S. Jobs

Wednesday, August 31, 2011
By Fred Lucas

Hilda Solis is sworn in as secretary of labor by Vice President Joe Biden. (AP photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

(CNSNews.com) – The U.S. Department of Labor told CNSNews.com in a written statement on Wednesday that it will enforce the federal wage laws on behalf of anyone working in the United States “regardless of their immigration status.” The statement was in response to a written question from CNSNews.com.

The written statement backed up a video statement that Labor Secretary Hilda Solis made to CNSNews.com on Monday in which she indicated that “partnership” agreements she had signed that day with a group of Latin American countries will obligate the U.S. government to protect the working conditions for both “documented and undocumented” migrant laborers here in the United States. (See earlier story.)

The Labor Department’s determination to make U.S. employers treat illegal aliens taking jobs in the United States as if they were U.S citizens or legal immigrants seems to contradict the Immigration and Nationality Act. That act says “employers may hire only persons who may legally work in the United States (i.e., citizens and nationals of the U.S.) and aliens authorized to work in the U.S.” and that the U.S. government “protects U.S. citizens and aliens authorized to accept employment in the U.S. from discrimination in hiring or discharge on the basis of national origin and citizenship status.”