New Basic Agreements concluded for NHO member companies

Download article in original language : NO9808182NNO.DOC

The new Basic Agreements between Norway's NHO employers' organisation and the YS and LO trade union confederations - concluded in 1998 - stipulate that a collective agreement may be put into operation when a union organises at least 10% of the relevant employees. NHO was unable to gain support for a proposal making it harder to obtain a second collective agreement in companies already bound by an agreement.

Prior to the 1998 wage negotiations, the Confederation of Norwegian Business and Industry (Næringslivets Hovedorganisasjon, NHO) and the Confederation of Vocational Unions (Yrkesorganisasjonenes Sentralforbund,YS) concluded a new Basic Agreement. The negotiations between YS and NHO had broken down at one stage because YS did not accept NHO's proposal for stricter regulations on the setting up of competing collective agreements (NO9802152N). Basic agreements between the various confederations complement Norwegian labour law by defining principal goals and laying down a set of principles and procedures that regulate the relationship between the parties.

A new Basic Agreement between the Norwegian Confederation of Trade Unions (Landsorganisasjonen i Norge, LO) and NHO was concluded in February 1998. The agreement originally included two new provisions which stipulated the circumstances under which a trade union in a unionised workplace can require the employer to enter into a collective agreement. The new Basic Agreement stipulated that a collective agreement could be claimed only when a trade union organised at least 10% of the relevant employees. In addition, the agreement introduced stricter requirements in cases where there are already collective agreements for the relevant groups of employees. In cases where two or more employee organisations were competing to organise the same group of employees and thereby enter into an agreement, the new union would have to organise at least 30% of the relevant employees in order to be permitted to establish a second agreement.

YS considered the restrictions on setting up a second agreement as a threat to its own member unions. YS has far fewer members in NHO companies than the LO, and has usually been bound by the terms of the Basic Agreement negotiations between the LO and NHO. However, YS managed to conclude an agreement without the restrictions that NHO wanted, and as a result the second part of the new provision was also removed from the Basic Agreement between LO and NHO (NO9711134F).