Two oil workers' federations merge

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February 2000 saw the merger of two trade union federations representing workers in the Greek oil industry, POEDHV and POEEPDOPY, creating a new unified federation known as the Panhellenic Federation of Employees in Petroleum Products-Refineries and Chemical Industry (POEPDHV). One of the main objectives of the new federation is the introduction of a 35-hour working week in the sector.

On 15 May 1999, the Panhellenic Federation of Employees in Refineries and Chemical Industry (POEDHV) held a statutory conference in Aspropyrgos, Attiki, for the purpose of amending its rules to enable the trade unions affiliated to the Panhellenic Federation of Employees in Petroleum Products Marketing Companies and Mineral Oil, Petroleum and Liquid Gas Refineries (POEEPDOPY) to join the new unified federation that would result from the merger of the oil sector's two existing federations. The merger of POEDHV and POEEPDOPY to form the Panhellenic Federation of Employees in Petroleum Products-Refineries and Chemical Industry (POEPDHV) subsequently took place on 12 February 2000, at the first unified union conference in the industry since 1970. Out of the 8,000 workers in the sectors covered covered by the new federation, 5,700 are members.

Reasons and aims

In the view of the new president of POEPDHV, the creation of the new unified federation after 10 years of concentrated efforts puts an end to a 30-year split between unions in the petroleum industry and at the same time opens the way for creating a strong industry-wide federation which will represent the whole spectrum of the oil, natural gas and chemical industries across the board.

In this context, a basic objective for the coming period is to promote dialogue with the aim of both uniting POEPDHV with similar federations in the chemicals and pharmaceuticals industries, and of uniting the new federation with the Public Power Corporation Workers' Federation (GENOP-DEI), thus forming a larger and stronger federation in the energy sector. In the medium term, another objective of POEPDHV is to demand and design a single collective agreement for the sector. In the POEPDHV action plan for the transitional period prior to its first regular conference, a primary concern will be the organisational restructuring of the federation in the new conditions arising from unification. As a basic precondition for the more harmonious functioning of the federation, it is thought that all the member unions should become acquainted with each other and should be briefed on the problems of the extended area now covered by the new federation.

The most important questions to be addressed immediately by the new federation, which will form its basic framework of demands, relate to social insurance, taxation, reducing the working week to 35 hours and increasing employment.

With regard to taxation, a first step has recently been taken on the government side with an increase in the amount of employees' untaxed income. POEPDHV is calling for a readjustment of tax scales and a change in the relationship between direct and indirect taxation, of which employees would be the beneficiaries.

In the social insurance area, the federation will press for full pensions after 35 years of service (10,500 insurance stamps), with no lower age limit.

As concerns employment, POEPDHV maintains that unification will help increase employment, mainly by strengthening the unions' calls for a 35-hour working week, but also by addressing the phenomenon of contracting out. By contracting out, some companies try to reduce labour costs by reducing the number of costly permanent staff and by hiring contractors to do many jobs. In fact, they not only use contractors for casual or seasonal work such as maintenance, which might be acceptable to a certain degree to the unions, but also replace permanent, stable jobs with contractors. One factor which helps employers in their pursuit of this tactic is the procedure for hiring public servants through written examinations ( the "Peponis law"), which is aimed at restricting the unfair practices of past, but which has introduced much inflexibility into the hiring procedure (the oil industry is mostly publicly-owned). It is the belief of POEPDHV that the law is good as far as its philosophy is concerned, but that the way it operates in practice is not acceptable. That is why POEPDHV unions have called for the amendment of this law in the past, mainly in terms of the provisions regarding direct hiring - that is, the ability of oil refineries to hire the number of workers they need, at the times they need them.

Reduction of working time

The start of a dialogue on introducing the 35-hour week without loss of pay and without interfering with the organisation of working time or labour relations is probably the most basic and immediate objective of the new federation. According to initial analyses and assessments by the petroleum industry's trade union-linked Institute of Labour, implementation of the 35-hour working week without loss of pay poses no threat to competitiveness, provided it is carried out under certain conditions; it is estimated that the increase in employment (including jobs which will be saved) will amount to about 10% of total employment in the sector. However, in order to ensure the necessary conditions, says the Institute, there must be a long-term "social contract" among all three sides: trade union organisations, the employers' side and the state.

The impact of reduced working time on production costs and product prices and therefore on competitiveness is a function of many factors. According to the Institute, such effects therefore depend on the conditions in which reduction of working time might be implemented. These conditions will not be set without the intervention of the social partners: the social dialogue and political will may be the most important factors in the success of the endeavour, either by determining the changes which will occur in the most important cost areas, or by determining a long-term plan for implementing the 35-hour week.

The study by the industry's Institute of Labour stated that reorganisation of work should be accompanied by an effort to improve the quality and types of products. It also found that reduction of working time must be substantial rather than gradual, because enterprises which attempt to reduce working time by degrees - eg through small reductions of one hour per year - do not hire any new staff but fill in the "gaps" in production with an additional increase in productivity: they reorganise production in such a way that no new jobs are created, so that they do not have to hire any new workers.

The state is also seen as playing an important role, relative to the transfer of resources to enterprises implementing working time reductions.

It is worth noting that wages in the Greek oil sector are currently low, both in relation to the past and in relation to the other countries of the EU. Unit labour costs are also significantly lower than EU averages, and have fallen substantially.

On the basis of these facts, the argument that in the event of a drastic reduction in working time an increase in hourly labour costs will lead to reduced competitiveness in the sector, and that it will restrict companies' ability to self-finance their investments, is not considered to be sound by the Institute of Labour.

Commentary

At a time when mergers are taking place both on the national and on the international levels among petroleum sector enterprises in order to serve their interests better, the best and most effective answer by the Greek trade unions is the creation of the new unified federation, opening the way for creating an even stronger industry-wide federation to address the broader demands and problems of workers in the industry. This choice is of particular importance for conditions in Greece, where fragmentation of the trade union movement is the most usual phenomenon. Unification also opens the way for effectively demanding reduction of the working week to 35 hours in the chemicals industry and refineries sector. However, the success of this endeavour depends on the ability of the new federation to transform its newly increased numerical strength into effective bargaining power. (Evangelia Soumeli, INE-GSEE/ADEDY)