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TUC Education European ReviewIssue 49 March 2010 In this issue :
Welcome to the twenty third issue of the new-look European Review which is emailed four times a year as a supplement to those registered to receive TUC Education Update. A hard copy will also be posted to Union Education Officers, TUC course co-ordinators and tutors. Everyone with an interest in European affairs as they affect trade unionists can still access the magazine online at http://www.tueip.dircon.co.uk/ or at http://www.unionlearn.org.uk/education/index.cfm?mins=88 Bargaining round upIN BULGARIA TRADE UNIONS HAVE RECENTLY EXPERIENCED varying degrees of success in negotiation with employers and the government. Disputes in the railway and paper sectors were satisfactorily resolved while a Turkish road-building firm proved more obdurate. The economic slump was blamed by both the National Railway Infrastructure Company and paper-making firm Kostenetz for non-payment of wages which had led to workers' families being without water and electricity, according to the forestry union federation. After strikes at both enterprises, back payments were secured as well as other benefits such as food vouchers and pension insurance. Employees of Mapa Cengiz constructing a motorway near Sofia found that they were expected to work extra hours and on national holidays with no additional wages while sanitary facilities and health and safety precautions were non-existent. After forming a union last August they were subjected to harassment by the company which was eventually found to have committed over 80 violations by the Labour Inspectorate. Further accidents in November resulted in serious injury and the involvement of the Prime Minister as the project was 75% financed with EU money. SLOVAKIAN UNIONS FOUND THEMSELVES CLOSER to government than the employers when discussions on increasing the minimum wage extended over the summer. They asked for 9%, similar to that agreed in 2008 but employers' organisations, citing a fall in the demand for labour as unemployment increases in the economic downturn, wanted to maintain the rate at the 2008 level or even to decrease it to that of 2007. The mechanism agreed for calculating the rate indicated a rise of 8.1% taking it to €319.50 a month. This increase was therefore proposed by the government but rejected by the National Union of Employers. The Confederation of Trade Unions, KOZ-SR, accepted and the Federation of Employers' Associations counter-proposed 3-4%. Meanwhile, due to the economic slump, salaries in the public sector look set for much lower rises than in recent years. Three union confederations have agreed on a 1% increase compared with the 5-7% enjoyed by public servants and 8% for civil servants in 2009. SPANISH AIRLINE IBERIA, WHICH PLANS TO merge with British Airways, has managed to open talks with unions on a cuts package after agreeing a deal on pay for cabin crew whose rates had been frozen since 2005. After strikes in October and November had led to the cancellation of around 800 flights, the company settled for a 4% rise for 2009. Now they will press the two largest independent trade unions in the sector to agree to a salary freeze for the next two years, a halt to recruitment until 2012, voluntary redundancies and compulsory early retirement. GM announces first Opel closure as Volvo, Saab find buyersWITH THE DEMISE OF THE ON-OFF DEAL BETWEEN US car manufacturer General Motors and a Russian-Canadian consortium who offered to buy GM's European subsidiary Opel, unions, governments and workers were anxious to find out where the inevitable axe was now going to fall. Their wait has now ended as Opel executive Nick Reilly announced the closure of the Antwerp factory and an intention to cut 8,300 jobs, 4,000 of them in Germany. Angry IG Metall union official, Armin Schild denounced the move as 'declaration of war' on European workers while John Monks, General Secretary of the ETUC described it as 'a massive blow to manufacturing in Belgium'. Peter Scherrer of the European Metalworkers' Federation explained that he believed the decision to be a political one as the 'small SUV, which GM promised would be manufactured in Antwerp, is now going to be produced in South Korea'. Also thought to be part of the company's restructuring plan is a €2.7 billion support package from various European governments and an agreement on wage cuts with trade unions amounting to €265 million a year. So far the European Commission has not received any notification of financial support from a Member State and no deal on wage cuts is likely to be forthcoming as long as factories are closed according to German works council leader Rainer Einenkel: 'We will not pay for the closure of Antwerp' he promised.
Meanwhile, across Europe, two other ailing vehicle manufacturers, one of them another GM subsidiary, seemed to be about to go down the alternative route of takeover. Agreement was reached to sell Saab to Spyker, a Dutch luxury car maker. After months of negotiation, which at times involved other bidders including Formula 1 boss Bernie Ecclestone, the deal eventually included a €400 million loan from the European Investment Bank backed by the Swedish government as well as a payment of $74 million to former owner GM. Saab's 3,400 workers were expected to be joined by others in dependent companies to make a total of 8,000 redundancies, some in factories in Germany and Austria but mainly around its headquarters in southern Sweden, as GM were already winding down its operations when the car-maker was bought.  Saab fans protest in Detroit Down the road in Gothenburg Sweden's other volume car manufacturer Volvo looks likely to be saved, this time by a Chinese company. Geely started out making parts for refrigerators but now operates six car factories across China as well as plants in the Ukraine, Russia and Indonesia. It is reported to be willing to pay Volvo's current owner Ford between $1.5 and $2 billion by May. Unions representing the 22,000 workers travelled to Shanghai to ask Geely management about fears that new technology will not be shared with the Chinese company for fear of it being copied. 'We also want a promise that development and manufacturing will remain in Gothenburg' added Mikael Sällström, chair of Volvo's IF Metall chapter. EU staff strike as governments cut pay riseTHE EFFECTS OF THE ECONOMIC slump in Europe came closer to home for the EU authorities in December and January when staff employed by the European Commission, Parliament, Council and Court of Justice staged a strike. Although an increase of 3.7% was awarded according to a long standing mechanism which takes into account salary rises in eight EU Member States and the costs of living in Brussels, EU governments felt that it was too large when workers were taking pay cuts and losing their jobs all over the continent.
They voted to grant a rise of 1.85%. The six unions representing the staff held a demonstration outside the Council of Ministers building and promised more actions to come. Renzo Carpenito, local rep. for the FFPE union, said, 'The personnel here work very hard, often late into the evening, to solve European problems'. Simon Coates, of the same union expressed satisfaction with the number of people attending the demonstration, adding that 'most desks in the building were empty'. However there may be a white knight riding to the rescue of the staff as the European Commission regard the governments' decision as illegal and plan to challenge it in the European Court of Justice. Although this judgment will be complicated by the fact that the court staff are also in line for the pay rise, the Commission would appear to be on firm ground as they won a similar ruling in 1973. WE HAVE FOLLOWED IN THESE PAGES the twists and turns of negotiating the next phase of the National Social Partnership Agreement in Ireland. Usually including multi-year pay deals between unions, the government and private employers, these agreements had proved very successful since 1987 in maintaining peace in labour relations and underpinning a continual rise in prosperity. Unfortunately the pay provisions of the 2006 social partnership 'Towards 2016' ran out just as the world financial crisis was beginning to hit the Irish economy. After difficult talks it appeared to have been rescued with the inclusion of a 'pay pause' before rises would take effect but, as the country entered a deep depression, both government and employers reneged on their commitments. According to a survey by the Irish Business and Employers Confederation (IBEC) only 12% of firms awarded pay increases during 2009 while 54% applied a freeze and 22% cut pay. Government too has effectively reduced salaries with a 'pensions levy' in the public sector and is expected to further reduce them in its 2010 budget. Unsurprisingly trade union reaction has been swift. After a demonstration attended by 120,000 people in Dublin, negotiations on a new deal started but during the first three quarters of 2009, a total of 81,530 working days were lost through strikes, compared with 4,179 days during the whole of 2008. The 66,887 days lost in the third quarter of 2009 was the highest quarterly figure since 2001. Finally, in December IBEC pulled out of talks saying that 'The terms of the current pay agreement were agreed in a radically different economic context and are now utterly inappropriate. It would be reckless to attempt to apply those terms in the current circumstances, with so many employers fighting for their very survival'. Trade unions described the withdrawal as a 'stunt' and intend to pursue the non-payment of increases due under the current deal. It is expected that unionised companies will now return to local wage bargaining for the first time in over twenty years as IBEC has prepared guidelines for them which will be finalised during meetings with the Irish Congress of Trade Unions early this year. More women wanted in top jobs in the NetherlandsA NUMBER OF GROUPS IN THE Netherlands seem to agree that women are under-represented in top jobs in both companies and public sector bodies. However they have different views on how to change the situation. While the governing Labour party wants to set a target of 30% of executives in large companies being female by 2016, telecoms firm KPN has gone further in asking only women to be candidates for certain posts. Meanwhile a group of over 200 female executives have called for an enforceable quota of 40%, as in Norway. They point out that the current figure of 5.7% at boardroom level will only stand at 12% in 2035 at the present rate of increase. Trade union federation FNV supports this position and has started negotiating with employers on the issue. Studies by the government body on part-time working have revealed deeper reasons in Dutch society for the lack of participation of female employees at higher levels. Although most women of working age now have jobs, the average number of hours worked is 25 compared to 37 for men. The vast majority of female part-time workers expressed no desire to work longer hours and were ambitious in terms of depth and fulfilment in their jobs as opposed to men who valued promotion more highly. Employers generally accepted the possibility of part-time executives but regarded such posts at managerial level as more problematic.
Chair of the Part-Time Plus Taskforce, Pia Dijkstra, concludes that the pattern of part-time working as soon as a woman has a child is taken for granted in the Netherlands regardless of its impact on career development. While employers must change attitudes, for instance towards careers for the over-45s, government also has a role to play. By incorporating music and swimming lessons into the school day and lengthening opening hours for shops and services it could reduce the onus on women to be available for childcare after 3 p.m. Pensioners fight back in Latvia as cuts declared illegalOF ALL EU MEMBER STATES THE HARDEST HIT by the economic slump appears to have been Latvia. Once it had the biggest snarl of the 'Baltic tigers' as economic growth, credit and pay rates roared ahead. Since 2008 however the indicators have slammed into reverse and the economy is thought to have contracted by about 18% last year with unemployment reaching 21%. After reaching agreement on swingeing cuts demanded by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) (see issue 47) as a condition of a €8.5 billion loan the coalition government reduced public sector pay by 40% and pensions by at least 10%. Now however the pensioners have bitten back by winning their case before the country's Constitutional Court arguing that the cuts 'violated the individual's right to social security and the principle of the rule of law'. The court ordered the government to rescind the decrease by March and to pay back the difference, at an estimated total cost of €250 million. Discounting the strictures of the IMF it ruled that such agreements 'in and of themselves cannot serve as an argument about the limiting of basic rights'. US printer signs ground-breaking EWC dealTHE NEW EU DIRECTIVE ON EUROPEAN WORKS COUNCILS comes into force in June 2011 (see issue 45) but the world's largest printing firm, RR Donnelley, has already adopted many of its provisions in a deal signed with unions recently. Although based in Chicago the company employs about 40,000 people in more than 40 countries, including plants in the UK, France, Belgium, Poland, Hungary and the Netherlands. Following a request from the British Unite union and France's FILPAC-CGT in 2006, negotiations were started between the company and a Special Negotiating Body (SNB) consisting of employee reps from 12 European countries, as laid down in the directive. Although Donnelley management chose UK law to govern the works council, when the revised EU directive was adopted in May last year unions managed to incorporate the changes into the agreement with the company. Among its main features are definitions of 'information' and 'consultation' which follow those in the new directive and are designed to enable EWC reps to influence company decision-making. The subjects covered are: the company's structure, economic and financial situation, production and sales, the prospects of the business, the probable trend of employment and investments, substantial changes concerning organisation, the introduction of new working methods, transfers of production, mergers, cutbacks or closures and collective redundancies. Annual meetings of the full council with a maximum trade union presence of 20 will be supplemented with more frequent select committee meetings involving three union reps. Extraordinary meetings will be held when a problem 'potentially substantially adversely affects employee interests'. The cost of holding the meetings plus the costs of employing one expert adviser for reps will be borne by the company. All reps and expert advisers must abide by confidentiality provisions that prevent them from revealing sensitive company information even after they have ceased to work there. Any disputes about the terms of the EWC agreement will first be settled within the council but, if unresolved after four months, a third party may be appointed and, if they are unable to reach a settlement, the parties will go to the UK courts. Steve Sibbald, a Unite national officer, who assisted the SNB, said 'The company have been very positive in their proposal ... which has resulted in a good agreement for Donnelley's European employees'. Spanish youth at bottom of pile as slump bitesTHE PLIGHT OF THE SO-CALLED EU periphery countries in the south and east has worsened as the economic downturn has become a slump. Spain, already near the bottom of the unemployment league table, has been hit both by the halt in construction and the cutbacks imposed by multinational companies. The bare figures are eloquent enough: in January another 125,000 people registered as unemployed, adding 3% to the total, pushing it above 4 million for the first time. In an echo of 80s Britain other measures put the total even higher, 4.3 million according to household surveys and 4.5 million or 19.4% according to unions. Because they often accepted temporary contracts in the good times young people have been the easiest to lay off and here the statistics are truly staggering, unemployment of 15-24 year-olds having jumped from 17.5% three years ago to the current figure of 42.9%. Although construction and manufacturing were the first to be hit, the malaise has now spread so that 82% of the January redundancies were in the service sector. Nor is there much hope of improvement any time soon, five times as many redundancy notices or EREs (see issue 46) were posted in the first nine months of 2009 compared to 2008, mainly by private manufacturers.  Newly redundant workers queue at a job centre in Madrid
European unions join mobilisation against poverty and social exclusionThe gap between rich and poor has widened in all European countries in recent years. Not just inequality but poverty and the inability to escape its consequences seem to be endemic, even in a prosperous part of the world like the European Union. In recognising this the European Commission has initiated the 'European Year for Combating Poverty and Social Exclusion' and invited trade union bodies to play a vital part in it.
Although having a job is the best way to reduce the risk, 8% of employed people are classified as the 'working poor'. The financial crash and subsequent economic slump have, of course, made things worse and the people of the EU are well aware of the situation as shown by a recent Eurobarometer survey. On average 73% think that poverty is widespread in their country with 84% believing that it has increased in the last three years. As regards who is responsible for improving things, most people (53%) look firstly to their national government but 74% see the EU's role as important. Bearing this in mind it is very apposite that the European Commission has launched its 'European Year for Combating Poverty and Social Exclusion'. The Employment, Social Affairs and Equal* Opportunities directorate says that 'time is ripe to renew our commitment to solidarity, social justice and greater inclusion' and provides a list of general actions such as inspiring 'each and every European citizen' to participate 'in the fight against poverty and social exclusion', giving voice to the concerns and needs of people experiencing them, engaging with relevant anti-poverty organisations and helping to deconstruct stereotypes and stigmas. One of the organisations that they have already engaged is the European Trade Union Confederation. Having already achieved agreement with European employers' organisations on a framework text on inclusive labour markets it wants to seize the opportunity that the dedicated year offers to secure a political commitment on employment, social protection, quality public services and an inclusive labour market by the end of 2010. The ETUC stresses that it has been active in combating poverty for twenty years and working with its partners the European Anti-Poverty Network and the European Disability Forum it intends to hold demonstrations, make appeals and organise conferences focussing on 'the guarantee of a decent income, the development of social standards, access to quality social services and access to employment, in particular for disabled people'.
Poland to tighten union recognition rules in divided workplacesThe Polish government intends to amend the rules on trade union representation in the workplace. They feel that employers are handicapped in negotiations where there are many unions and none takes precedence. The main national confederations of labour are generally in favour of some change but are wary of the specific proposals. After the fall of Communism in eastern Europe the demise of centralised, government-controlled trade unions led to a precipitant fall in membership. Since then there has been some recovery as workers in multinationals, new to the country, have got organised. This has often resulted in companies with a large number of unions, each representing a small percentage of the workforce. Strikes at Tesco in Poland in 2008 displayed this kind of fragmentation among union members. Now the government wants to change the rules to improve collective bargaining as they believe employers find it difficult to negotiate where unions are disunited and unable to take decisions. At present there is a threshold of 10% membership to obtain recognition and some firms with as many as ten competing trade union branches. Polish ministers, influenced by laws in the USA which allow bargaining only with unions having signed up 50% of the workforce, are proposing that 33% be the limit, although if no organisation reached that threshold the largest union would still be able to bargain. The government claims that its aim is not to diminish trade union influence but to make them more representative; however it also wants to address reps' protection against dismissal which it regards as applying too widely where there are numerous unions in a company. While there is support for raising the threshold in the national confederations, trade unions think that 33% would be excessive in a country where only 15% of employees are members of unions. The fate of the proposed reform may rest in the hands of Poland's president, Lech Kaczynski, who must approve it and has shown support for trade union positions in the past. This feature is largely based on an article in European Employment Review. Recent rulings from the European Court of JusticeGerman dentists must retire at 68, new firefighters be under 30 We have covered in previous issues various court decisions on the vexed question of compulsory retirement ages. The UK government seems to have got around the EU directive on equal treatment in employment by allowing employers to compel workers to retire at 65 if requests to carry on past this age are considered (see issue 44). Now Germany has also found some loopholes. A Ms. Petersen had protested the decision to retire her at 68, as demanded by the country's NHS, as age discrimination, outlawed by the directive. The German government argued that this rule was to protect public health and thus an exemption in the EU law. Although the ECJ rejected this it pointed to two more grounds for legitimate discrimination: the need to maintain financial stability in the public health system and to share out jobs among the generations. A related case from the same country concerned the fire service in Frankfurt. A Mr Wolf objected to being turned down for a job there on the grounds that he was over 30. The authorities submitted that the physical nature of a firefighter's work meant that employees older than 45 had to be assigned less demanding duties. If too many older workers were recruited the capacity of the service to carry out its activities would be reduced. The court decided that it was an 'occupational requirement' to have 'especially high physical capacities' and that the under-30 rule was 'proportionate' in trying to meet that requirement. This again was an allowable discrimination under the directive. World's biggest workplace safety campaign ends in summitTHE EUROPEAN AGENCY FOR SAFETY AND HEALTH AT WORK (OSHA) celebrated the end of its first two-year campaign with a summit in Bilbao, Spain in November. Record numbers of delegates paralleled the hundreds of events held and over two million fact sheets, DVDs etc. given away, during the course of the drive to inform particularly small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) of the benefits of risk assessment. Over 500 participants got the chance to hear and see specialists, researchers, union safety reps. and employers tell of the myriad of imaginative events that they had organised in workplaces as well as hundreds of submissions to the European Good Practice Awards and over 1,600 entries to a pan-European photography competition. The importance of the theme of the campaign was underlined when the results of the European Survey of Enterprises on New and Emerging Risks were presented showing that between 10% and 15% of companies with between 10 and 50 employees never carry out risk assessments. Another record was set when a total of 43 organisations, including well-known private companies such as Pirelli and the representatives of European employers and workers, Business Europe and the ETUC, signed up as official campaign partners. OSHA also chose the summit to preview its new Online Risk Assessment tool designed for SMEs*. After a hugely successful two years they are now turning their attention to the next two when the theme of the next campaign will be 'Safe Maintenance'. According to OSHA director Jukka Takala, 'with over 450 Europeans dying every day from work-related causes, and with 6% of European GDP being lost because of work accidents and ill health, it is vital that we continue to focus on workplace health and safety'.
Mine disaster adds to poor Turkish safety recordAN EXPLOSION IN A COAL MINE IN WESTERN TURKEY which killed 19 workers has added to the already grim safety statistics of the industry in the EU candidate country. A leak of methane gas is believed to have been the cause of the blast which occurred at a depth of 200 metres in December. The Minister for Energy, Taner Yildiz, announced that production would stop for six months while a manager and two employees were detained by the authorities. Turkish mines have a safety record that is considerably worse than most industrialised countries; the worst accident, at Zonguldak in 1992 having killed 270 miners. Trade unions blame a lack of proper safety regulations and inadequate inspections and the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM) point out that the government has not ratified the relevant international convention on safety and health in mines.
ETUC safety body opens up mag to non-specialists
'HesaMag aims to show that occupational health is not just a matter for the specialists, it is equally a question of everyday life and a major political issue' explained Laurent Vogel, the director of the ETUI's Health and Safety department.
New eYou Guide sets out your 'digital rights' A NEW WEB SITE MAINTAINED BY THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION aims to help internet users who stand confused at the intersection of technology and the law. The 'eYou Guide', which has recently been made available in ten languages, aims to answer questions on your rights online and 'is meant as a tool to improve consumers' awareness and confidence in the digital environment'. Topics covered include 'Privacy, safety and security', 'Advertising & offers', Copyright & Intellectual Property Rights, 'Disabled, Older people' and 'Taking action, redress'. Most of the site takes the form of example queries such as 'Is it secure to upload personal information on a website?'. These are sorted under the topic headings mentioned above, by actions like 'Internet services & Email', 'Online shopping and payments', 'Filesharing, networking and blogging' and 'TV/video online & games online', and according to a keywords list. There is also a copyright manual and a glossary of technical terms. Non A-Z languages reach top level of net THE .eu INTERNET WEB PAGE ADDRESS HAS been around for four years now and the domain names registered ending with .eu have now topped the 3 million mark. It is most popular in Germany which has registered over 900,000 .eus followed by the Netherlands, the UK and France. Now those countries which don't use the A to Z Latin alphabet will be able to register such addresses as Commissioner Viviane Reding 'Many internet users will come from countries where most languages are not based on the 'a to z' Latin script and they will naturally want to use their own scripts. The launch of international domain names under .eu will respond even better to the needs of a multilingual and multicultural Europe'. ETUC info caught in the social netFOLLOWING OUR ARTICLE IN THE LAST ISSUE on the conversion to Facebook and blogging of EU institutions we should mention a similar foray into social networking by their counterparts on the union side of the fence. The European Trade Union Confederation has had a presence on the photo-sharing web site 'Flickr', the video-uploader 'YouTube' and the real-time messaging network 'Twitter' since the summer. They have used their existing audiovisual gallery to fill up the first two while 'tweets' which must be shorter than 120 characters are utilised as a snappy way to link back to the main ETUC web site. Facebook posts lead to sack for Swedish workersSOCIAL NETWORK WEB SITE FACEBOOK has been accused of eroding personal privacy and the fate of two workers in Sweden would seem to serve as a warning of how it can mix up work life and private life to the detriment of both. An employee at a McDonald's restaurant in Örebro detailed her dissatisfactions with her workplace on her Facebook page but, unfortunately, the entry was seen by her boss. This indiscretion was enough for the line manager, Andreas Kenson, who summarily sacked the woman. To add insult to injury Mr. Kenson was also a Facebook fan and posted his account of the dismissal on his own page. None of this impressed Malin Ackholts, an official of the hotel and restaurant workers' union (HRF), who complained of 'poor judgment' by the supervisor who had not followed laws and collective agreements, while admitting that employees' grievances should be taken directly to employers rather than published online. A week later the curse of Facebook struck again in Sweden when a temporary nursery assistant near Stockholm unexpectedly had his contract terminated. Parents had accessed his Facebook page to find a photograph of him with a tattoo wearing a hat with the brand name 'Pornstar'. Although the picture had not been taken at the nursery, owner Peter Wallebo insisted it was not enough for it to be removed and sacked Mats Mügge who has complained to the country's Equality Ombudsman. Web sites and reports mentioned in this section are available at: ETUC-CES YouTube channel http://www.youtube.com/etucces#p/p ETUC-CES Flickr photostream http://www.flickr.com/photos/etuc-ces/ Etuces Twitter page eYou Guide http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/eyouguide/ Stats and factsFlexi-time on the rise across Europe as working hours show great variation In its second Europe-wide survey of companies the European Foundation for the Improvement of Working and Living Conditions has examined the progress of labour market flexibility. The EU's Lisbon strategy envisaged that this would be one of the primary movers in the quest to be 'the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world'. The findings confirm that working time flexibility is the most commonly used method and within this flexi-time, part-time, overtime and night, weekend and shift work are the main categories. More than half of all businesses with more than ten employees offer some kind of flexi-time, a big increase on 2005 when the last survey was carried out. Almost 40% of companies allow time to be banked so that workers can take surplus accrued time off at a later date and most of these accept whole days off in lieu. However only a minority of employers (6%) permit credit hours to be unclaimed for more than a year with Denmark the exception where 30% use these 'long-term accounts'.
State aid balloons due to crisis Figures for 2008 just released by the European Commission show that state aid to the economy showed a massive increase after the financial crash. A total of €279.6 billion was disbursed by Member States and the EU itself compared with €66.5 billion in 2007. In absolute terms the UK provided the most: €72.5 billion, but as a percentage of GDP Ireland was way out in front, paying out the equivalent of about 20% of the size of the country's economy.
Book charts move to individual rights in EUDarren O'Grady is a TUC tutor at the Trade Union Studies Centre South Thames College. He has been an active trade unionist all his working life, in the construction, film and now education industries. He is also a lay representative of the University and College Union (UCU) and Secretary of Waltham Forest Trades Council in East London. Here he reviews Transformation of Labour Law: A Comparative Study of 15 Countries 1945-2004 - ed. Hepple & Veneziani, (Hart) 2009 This volume is a companion to the earlier comparative study of the development of labour law up to 1945, which examined developments in the nine members of the EEC in 1979. The current book takes up the story and expands the remit to the fifteen members of the EU prior to the expansion in 2004. One of the key developments identified since 1980 has been the decline of collectivism. Accompanying this has been a shift from collective to individual rights, with the enforcement of these rights typically through the individual pursuit of a judicial route. Labour relations have become highly juridified in contemporary Europe, to a degree that would have been unimaginable in the earlier period studied. The great strength of the collection is the focus on context, with chapters looking at developments in labour market trends and structures of worker representation. This latter chapter illustrates that whilst differences persist within national labour law systems, there has been a great tendency towards convergence over the period. However there is nothing mechanical about this convergence, with many forces involved in a complex interaction.
Whilst probably not a book for a general readership, this is by no means an exclusively academic text. There is much of interest for active trade unionists and those with an interest in pan-European developments affecting workers. Diary: conferences and coursesGoing Green at Work 15 March European training for young trade union leaders 15-20 March Trade Unions and the Environment: Sustainable Development in the Workplace 30 March TUC Black Workers Conference 23-25 April Gender and globalisation to take the stage at TUC GENDER, GLOBALISATION AND POVERTY REDUCTION is the title of a two-day course set for the 8th and 9th of March at Congress House in Great Russell Street, Central London. It aims to examine the unequal impact of the globalisation process which has led to women forming an ever growing majority of the world's poor and asks if this is accidental or an integral part of the current economic and social changes. Speakers from the UK and abroad, including Hariyatu Bangura from Sierra Leone and Candida Barbato of the Ethical Trading Initiative, will also evaluate extent to which the UN's Millennium Development Goals and the ILO's Decent Work Agenda can be harnessed in combating this trend. Tailored to union reps, officers and tutors, the course enables workplace organising around these issues. For more information and a form to enrol, please contact Angie Birtill on 020 8918 7421 or email angie.birtill@south-thames.ac.uk
Newsletter (6,500 words) issued 5 Mar 2010  Occupational Health and Wellbeing in the workplace Trade Union Education in Preston Provided by Manchester College Union rep courses Scotland – January to June 2012 |
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EUROSTAT STATISTICS ON POVERTY IN THE EU make for sobering reading. In one of the richest areas of the globe 17% of citizens are at risk of poverty with the under-17s and over-65s most precarious. These 80 million people live on less than 60% of average European household income. In 2008, 37% of European citizens could not afford a one-week annual holiday away from home, 10% could not afford to keep their home adequately warm and 9% could not afford a meal with meat or fish every second day.
HesaMag is the chosen name of a new publication from the European Trade Union Institute (ETUI). The twice-yearly, large-format glossy will aim to appeal to a wider public than the newsletter that it replaces. The style of the magazine will vary between short news items and in-depth articles on a particular problem, the first issue highlights nanotechnologies, with a wealth of photos, graphs and illustrations. It is envisaged that reports, interviews, surveys and pieces on popular science will combine with book reviews and accounts of trade union activity in the health and safety field to give an international feel.
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(in the Greek and Cyrillic alphabets). All 23 official languages of the EU are now catered for so that Greek and Bulgarian speakers can recognise local web sites. According to outgoing Information Society
Perhaps the key chapter of the book is that which looks at the relationship between current economic orthodoxies and legal systems. The book identifies five key phases of developments, the latest being that from 1900 and the impact of globalisation. The ascendancy of neo-liberalism in mainstream political and economic circles has been accompanied by a distinct shift in judicial attitudes at both domestic and EU level. The overt sympathy for free market principles at the expense of those emphasising collectivity for example in the ECJ decisions of Viking et al, has been well noted by many trade unionists. This tendency is explored and set in a wider context that is very illuminating.