THE Patriotic Front (PF) and the labour movement have agreed to regularly engage in dialogue on labour matters.

The parties at the just ended symposium also agreed that the national strategy on employment creation should be designed and implemented as unemployment was a serious challenge at the core of national development.

The parties which comprised the PF, the Zambia Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) and the Federation of Free Trade Unions of Zambia(FFTUZ) said this in a communiqué released after a two-day consultative conference held at Cresta Golf View in Lusaka.

The communiqué signed by the PF Secretary General Wynter Kabimba, (in picture) FFTUZ president Joyce Nonde- Simukoko and ZCTU president Leonard Hikaumba stated that the national strategy on employment creation should adopt a direct approach.

The approach should place the employment objective at the centre of the macroeconomic framework.

The communique said consistent with the strategy should be the reorientation of the educational doctrine to ensure that training curricula was responsive to the changing labour market needs and industrial requirements.

"The strategy should show how employment will be provided, where it will come from and what kind of employment will be provided, along with what safeguards will ensure decent employment," the communiqué says.

It was also agreed that the Tripartite Labour Consultative Council legal standing be strengthened to ensure that agreements reached during sittings could translate into instruments of law or policy.

This would improve its effectiveness in sustaining social dialogue among concerned parties.

They agreed that an independent Tripartite Council secretariat be created and should have branches in all provincial centres and districts.

They acknowledged that collective bargaining provided a means to sustain industrial peace and harmony.

They noted that the supremacy of Government intervention should be minimised and may only be invoked if there was inconsistence with the law and not as a substitute for the due process of collective bargaining.