Collective bargaining in 1997 examined

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In June 1998, France's tripartite National Commission for Collective Bargaining reviewed the Ministry for Employment and Solidarity's report on the state of collective bargaining during 1997. The report highlights stability in intersectoral bargaining, a noticeable loss of impetus in sectoral bargaining and a strong increase in company-level bargaining (up 27%), mainly due to the implementation of the Robien law on working time.

On 23 June 1998, the National Commission for Collective Bargaining (Commission nationale de la négociation collective) - made up of representatives of employers' organisations and trade union confederations, chaired by the Minister for Employment and Solidarity - reviewed the Ministry for Employment and Solidarity's annual report on the state of collective bargaining in France. According to the report ("La négociation collective en 1997" ["Collective bargaining in 1997"], Tome I: "La tendance, les dossiers" [Volume I: Trends, issues] and "Tome II: chiffres et documents" ["Volume II: statistics and documents"], Ed La documentation française, Paris (1998)), in 1997, in an economic context of strong growth (2.5% GDP growth, compared with 1.5% in 1996), collective bargaining experienced contrasting fortunes.

The report states that intersectoral bargaining (négociation interprofessionnelle) - with a total of 45 agreed texts (including six agreements and 37 amendments to existing agreements) - was at a similar level to that of preceding years (57 texts in 1996 and 41 in 1995). Sectoral bargaining (négociation de branche), which in 1996 had recorded a considerable advance on preceding years (FR9707157F), underwent a "noticeable slowdown" in 1997 (a fall of 16% in texts signed), which, in the opinion of Ministry officials, was due to the fact that "the social partners were awaiting the Government's guidance and incentive measures contained in the law on working time announced in autumn 1997" - ie the law on the 35-hour working week (FR9806113F). It should be remembered that following the 10 October 1997 conference when this legislation was announced, the National Council of French Employers (Conseil national du patronat français, CNPF), which disputed the form and content of the Government's proposals, announced a freeze on intersectoral and sectoral bargaining (FR9710169F).

Company-level bargaining (négociation d'entreprise), on the other hand, increased by 27%, which translated as a total of 11,797 agreements. This increase can be explained by dynamic negotiations on working time and employment, which were given impetus by various government measures in favour of job creation and working time reduction. However, despite strong growth, it should be noted that only 10% to 15% of workers are covered by a company-level agreement on the organisation of working time.

Working time and employment dominate bargaining

At sector level, 1997 saw very few collective agreements on working time implementing the intersectoral agreement of 31 October 1995 and the "Robien law". The agreement was signed by the CNPF and four trade union confederations - the French Democratic Confederation of Labour ( Confédération française du travail, CFDT), the French Christian Workers' Confederation (Confédération française des travailleurs chrétiens, CFTC), the General Confederation of Labour-"Force Ouvrière" (Confédération générale du travail-Force ouvrière, CGT-FO) and the General Confederation of Professional and Managerial Staff-French Confederation of Professional and Managerial Staff (Confédération générale des cadres-Confédération française de l'encadrement, CGC-CFE). It sought a reduction and annualisation of working time by encouraging individual sectors to reach agreements to put in place both measures. The "Robien law", which came into effect in June 1996, provides for a partial exemption from employers' social security contributions, if a collective agreement (at sector or company level) provides for a large reduction in hours worked, combined with a reorganisation of working time, enabling jobs to be created, or redundancies avoided (FR9705146F).

Although three-quarters of the 128 sectors with more than 10,000 employees initiated negotiations on working time following the intersectoral agreement, the number of actual agreements fell short of what could have been expected - 25 sectoral agreements in 1996 and a total of 44 by the end of 1997. The report points out that "these agreements have had very little direct effect on employment, mainly due to the limited importance they gave to the reduction of working time and due to its limited scope even where it was included."

At company level, 1997 was characterised by the "globalisation" of bargaining issues. The report makes special mention of the links between jobs, working time and pay. Most agreements on the reduction of working time include "full compensation" clauses guaranteeing the maintenance of monthly pay at current levels when hours cuts are introduced, though often accompanied by future pay freezes or moderation. The globalisation of bargaining issues also concerned the links between job classification and vocational training.

The Robien law acted as a "booster" for negotiations at company level. More than half (6,061) of all the agreements signed in 1997 concerned working time. This increase on previous figures was mainly due to the 1,968 "Robien" agreements implementing the law. Two-thirds of the agreements were of the "offensive" type (creating jobs) and one-third were of the "defensive" type (avoiding redundancies). Half of these agreements were concluded in companies employing fewer than 50 workers. In addition, two-thirds of the agreements went hand in hand with a reorganisation of work.

Agreements reached in the absence of union delegates

An intersectoral collective agreement on collective bargaining of 31 October 1995, given legal status by the law of 12 November 1996, introduced the procedure of "mandating" (mandatement) (FR9807123F). This means that in companies with no trade union delegate or workforce delegate fulfilling the duties of a union delegate, an employee can be mandated by a nationally representative trade union to sign collective agreements. Normally, bargaining rights are essentially restricted to union representatives. This procedure came into effect in the fourth quarter of 1996, but statistics on its use have been recorded only since January 1997. The Ministry's report highlights the difficulty in recording the exact scale of this phenomenon: "The wording of the texts registered with departmental labour directorates has not always allowed new bargaining procedures to be positively identified and therefore the actual extent of the procedure could have been slightly underestimated."

The Ministry puts the number of agreements signed by mandated employees in 1997 at 620 (40 other agreements were signed by elected staff representatives - another mandating option). It is these agreements that have largely contributed to an increase in bargaining in small companies. It was CFDT and CFTC that made greatest use of the mandating procedure - 59% of these agreements were signed by employees mandated by CFDT and 23% by CFTC-mandated employees. The other unions made less use of this mechanism (CGT-FO - 7%, CFE-CGC - 5% and CGT- 4%).

Commentary

The annual report on collective bargaining is the only nationwide measure of bargaining activity at the various levels - intersectoral, sectoral and company. It enables a few of the most important trends and developments to be evaluated from year to year. Nevertheless, the report, which quantifies agreements as they were submitted to the Ministry for Employment's offices, is of very limited use in understanding the reality of industrial relations and the real issues discussed by the social partners. For example, employment and working time are sometimes dealt with separately within agreements and sometimes as a whole. This is also the case for the relationship between working time and pay: if part-time working is introduced, the emphasis may be on the reduction of working time or on the maintenance or reduction of paybill. It is for these varied reasons that it is necessary, especially for non-French readers, to see this report for what it really is, - the quantifying of agreements reached during the year - and not to infer any comparisons with other systems of industrial relations. (Alexandre Bilous, IRES).