WORLD NEWS | Tue Jan 24, 2017 | 5:01pm EST

Brazil prosecutor says Temer labor reforms illegal

Brazil's top labor prosecutor said President Michel Temer's proposals to modernize the country's labor laws were illegal in a report published on Tuesday that provided ammunition to workers' unions fighting the reforms.

Updating outdated labor laws to allow outsourcing and more flexibility in contracts and work hours is part of Temer's plan to reduce business costs and pull Brazil from its worst recession on record. But his proposal has come under fire even before it was discussed in Congress.

"In times of crisis, workers need more protection not less," Prosecutor-General for Labor Ronaldo Fleury, whose office in responsible for chasing labor law violations from slavery to child labor, said at a news conference.

Fleury said the government's proposal to do away with the eight-hour workday limit to allow more temporary employment and two other proposals already in Congress to expand outsourcing and allow workers to be paid per hour worked were unconstitutional and broke international labor conventions.

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