Restructuring, Quality employment, Germany
Health and social care: union defends works council but faces fight over dismissals
Services union ver.di has successfully fought off attempts by the Nord Residenz care company to shut down the works council. On 27 April, the regional labour court in Bremen in North West Germany ruled against the company’s attempts to dismiss the works council chair and her deputy, expel them from the works council and dissolve the works council itself. Nord Residenz is owned by the French multinational Orpea. Ver.di welcomed the many messages of solidarity support from trade unions across Europe and interventions by the state government and mayor of Bremen. Meanwhile, the union faces a major
Social partnership solutions and good practice models to reduce psychosocial risks and burdens in health care
EPSU has supported a transnational project involving EPSU affiliates from six countries to promote social partnership solutions and good practice models to reduce psychosocial risks and burdens in health care.
5000 workers affected by health firm's insolvency
Around 5000 employees of the Paracelsus health company found out just before Christmas that the firm was insolvent. Their trade union, ver.di, said it was a bad day for both workers and patients and blamed mismanagement for the failure. The union said that workers had foregone their Christmas bonuses in 2013 and 2014 but the company had failed to deliver on the new investment promised at the time. This year the collective bargaining committee had refused to give up the bonus but the failure of the company to pay it in November was an early indication of the problems ahead. Ver.di has called on
Union secures wide-ranging agreement with energy company
After lengthy negotations, services union ver.di has endorsed a new agreement with the Uniper energy company that it will put to its members over the coming weeks. Key elements of the deal are commitments to no compulsory redundancies and to an early retirement scheme, seen by ver.di as important for the company's coal-powered operations that will face restructuring. This part of the agreement will run to 2022 while the long-term pay deal will run to 2024. The union prevented the company from cutting bonuses like Christmas pay but performance pay will be ended. In 2018 workers will get a lump
Union targets hospitals in negotiations to reduce workloads
Services union ver.di is targetting a selection of public and private hospitals in seven regions, calling on them to negotiate agreements to reduce excessive workloads. The union argues that many healthworkers are under pressure to work long hours to fill the gap left by a shortage of 162000 workers across the sector. This is having a detrimental impact on workers' health and ver.di wants employers to recognise this and their responsibility to provide good working conditions.