2013 September epsucob@NEWS 15

ITUC Letter to Victor PontaThe ITUC global trade union confederation has written to Romanian prime minister Victor Ponta to express its concern over his government's determination to leave the labour law, passed by the previous government – unchanged. There had been an agreement with trade unions to revise both the new Labour Code and the new Social Dialogue Law that have lead to a significant worsening of working conditions and deterioration of collective bargaining. Precarious work is now much more widespread and the percentage of the population living below the poverty line is one of the

Firefighters in England and Wales took four hours of strike action in protest at proposed changes to their pension and retirement arrangements that would lead to active firefighters seeing their retirement age increase from 55 to 60. Meanwhile the government in Scotland has been more open to negotiation and the FBU firefighters' union there balloting its members over the latest proposals from the employers. These include provisions to protect firefighters whose fitness declines with age from losing both their job and their pension entitlement and enhanced ‘transitional protection arrangements’

The STAL local government union reports that the Constitutional Court has ruled that a number of changes to the Labour Code made in 2012 are invalid. The revisions cover negotiated holiday entitlement and compensatory rest, as well as rules on redundancy that had required employers to take seniority into account and to try to find jobs for workers made redundant. The rulings apply mainly to private sector employees who will get three days of holiday entitlement this year as well as any compensatory rest not taken since January 2012. Any workers dismissed since the beginning of 2012 will have

Over 100 social care workers, members of the UNISON public services union, are due to take a further 10 days of strike action. They are protesting against their employer's decision to cut workers' pay and conditions and in some cases basic pay has been reduced by one-third. Over 80% of the workers are women and predominantly part-time. UNISON has tried to negotiate with the company, Future Directions, which is actually owned by Calderstones NHS Trust, part of the National Health Services. The workers have already taken 19 days of industrial action over the last four months. [Read more at >

The SIPTU and IMPACT trade unions have said they will not cooperate with the transfer of staff and responsibilities from area partnership and leader companies to local authorities. This is in response to the deliberate exclusion of unions from consultation on the transfer of the 21 companies that were set up to tackle unemployment in certain areas, to ten local authorities. This is despite the fact that the minister responsible has said that the process will result in job losses. IMPACT has asked local authority workers to withdraw their cooperation too. [Read more at > IMPACT->http://www

The GPA-DJP services union has underlined the effectiveness of relying on minimum wages in collective agreements. A recent report by the Hans Böckler-Stiftung in Germany notes that Austria has one of the smallest percentage of low-paid workers in Europe. This is down to the very high level of collective bargaining coverage with most sector agreements having a monthly minimum salary of at least €1300, several with €1400 and with unions pushing for a €1500 minimum. Trade unions still need to work on some areas of the economy where workers are not covered by collective agreements as well as

Services union ver.di highlights the findings of a recent TV documentary that exposes the permament pressure on pay and conditions in the health sector. Health workers are being outsourced to subsidiary companies where they face lower pay and even the transfer onto so-called service contracts rather than proper employment contracts. The use of agency work is also spreading. Ver.di argues that these changes are having a negative and potentially dangerous impact as morale falls, workers become ill and the quality of care is undermined. [Read more at > ver.di (DE)->http://gesundheit-soziales

The Kommunal municipal workers' union has signed a new collective agreement with the ALMEGA service employers' organisation covering employees in home care. The agreement runs from 1 September 2013 to 30 September 2016 and provides for a minimum salary increase of SEK 1700 (€196) full-time workers, much more than the employers' initial offer. The increase is flat rate in krona increases in line with other industry agreements aimed at benefiting the lower paid. Minimum salaries for full-time workers aged 20 will rise to SEK 18749 (€2160) on 1st September 2013, SEK 19159 (€2210) on 1 September

Unions have been disappointed after the third round of collective bargaining in the municipal sector. The employers have made no offer of a pay rise for 2013 or 2014 and nor have they taken up the unions' proposals for increasing youth employment in the sector. The employers claim that local government workers will see their pay rise by 2% but the unions point out that this is only a net pay rise resulting from lower pension contributions which are linked with a deterioration in the pension scheme. [Read more at > FNV Abvakabo (NL)->http://www.abvakabofnv.nl/over-ons/nieuws/nieuwsoverzicht

The FOA public services union argues that political action is needed as part of a strategy to close the gender pay gap. The latest statistics show that the gender pay gap is still 17.4%, unchanged since 2009. In contrast, there was nearly a three percentage point narrowing of the gap between 2007 and 2009 and that is probably attributable to the action taken by several groups of workers in women dominated sectors in 2008 to secure higher pay increases. FOA would like to see government and social partners working together and setting a common target in a way that they do in Finland. [Read more