Jørgensen, Carsten

In August 2001, the Confederation of Danish Trade Unions (Landsorganisationen i Danmark, LO) and the Danish Confederation of Employers' Associations in Agriculture (Sammenslutningen af Landbrugets Arbejdsgiverforeninger, SALA) concluded a new cooperation agreement [1], which covers about 55,000 employees in enterprises in the agricultural sector. This constitutes a revision and extension of the existing cooperation agreement between LO and SALA and one of the aims is to intensify initiatives aimed at promoting an 'inclusive labour market' (DK0104117N [2]). [1] www.eurofound.europa.eu/ef/efemiredictionary/co-operation-agreements [2] www.eurofound.europa.eu/ef/observatories/eurwork/articles/government-sets-new-employment-targets

In June 2001, the US-based multinational information technology group Intel closed down its Danish division and dismissed 200 employees. Some of them held share options – ie the right to buy company shares at a fixed, lower price with the prospect of substantial profits at a later stage. These options were provided as part of the remuneration of the employees concerned. After the closure, Intel announced that only so-called 'mature' options could be redeemed and then only within three months of the Danish operation's last working day on 31 July. This meant that employees with 'non-mature' options, which provide only a right to buy Intel shares at a future point in time, will lose part of their salary and indeed will essentially pay back a part of their salary. Intel's spokesperson in Europe has stated that Intel never comments on such cases.

Danish professionals are working increasingly long hours, and for certain occupational groups the average weekly working time is 45-50 hours. Among engineers, only one out of 10 works the standard collectively agreed 37-hour week, while one out of four works more than 44 hours. In consultancy and contracting firms, only 2% of professionals work the standard 37 hours, compared with 7% in 2000. These figures are taken from a study undertaken in summer 2001 by the Jyllands-Posten newspaper, which contacted the trade unions representing highly educated groups of employees; the figures are not broken down by gender.

According to a new study of industrial relations in Danish professional football, the Danish Football Players' Union (Spillerforeningen [1]) is a successful trade union with a very high membership rate, good contacts with private sponsors and considerable skill in navigating between the individual and collective needs of the players. The study, which is the first of its kind in a sector not often examined in an industrial relations context, was published in June 2001 by Kristian Nielsen of the Department of Sociology at the University of Copenhagen. [1] http://www.spillerforeningen.dk/

The Danish parliament's adopted a bill [1] (/2000/1 LSF 215/) amending the Act on Equal Pay for Men and Women on 1 June 2001, the last working day before the summer parliamentary recess. The aim of the new Act is to create a higher degree of transparency in wage data, especially in the light of equal pay for women and men. As from 1 June 2002, employees, employee representatives, the Equal Opportunities Board (Ligestillingsnævnet) and trade unions with one or more members in an enterprise may require companies with more than 10 employees to draw up wage statistics. Furthermore, from the same date, employees will be explicitly allowed to discuss wages openly, as it will no longer be lawful to impose a duty of secrecy on employees relating to pay matters. [1] http://www.retsinfo.dk/_GETDOCI_/ACCN/200011L00215-LOVF

At a staff meeting in January 2001, the management of the P Nordsten A/S plant at Skive, Jutland announced that the firm's owner, Kongskilde Industries, would be closing the factory and moving production of agricultural machinery to Poland on 31 March 2003. Management offered the employees a wage compensation scheme in the two-year period up until their redundancy, with a view to ensuring an orderly closure process. This wage compensation was also intended automatically to suspend the annual pay bargaining rounds at the company. At the end of February, the director of P Nordsten A/S and three employee representatives signed a local wage agreement introducing the compensation scheme for two years, whereafter the local agreement will expire without further notice. During this two-year period, all employees are free to seek new jobs.

On 4 April 2001, the Minister of Labour, Ove Hygum, and the Minister of Social Affairs, Henrik Dam Kristensen, launched a booklet entitled "Everybody is needed - Denmark 2010 and a more flexible labour market" (Brug for alle - Danmark 2010 og et mere rummeligt arbejdsmarked [1]). The context is a belief that in the coming years, Denmark will need all the people who are capable of doing so to work, so as to prevent higher taxes or a general setback for the Danish welfare society resulting from the growing numbers of older people and smaller numbers of young people. "If we are not able to create the inclusive labour market today, we never will be," said Mr Hygum. [1] http://www.am.dk/publikationer/2001/brugforalle/brugforalle.pdf

A new study among members of the General Workers' Union (Specialarbejderne i Danmark, SiD), published in February 2001, indicates that a third of members are working longer than the standard 37 hours per week fixed by collective agreement - see the table below. Notably, the members of the SiD transport section - including export drivers - have a working time of about 48 hours per week. Of all members surveyed, 8% work more than 48 hours per week. The study was carried out on behalf of SiD by the Centre for Labour Market Research at Aalborg University (Center for arbejdsmarkedsforskning at Aalborg Universitet, CARMA) and Dansk Markedsanalyse (DMA Research). SiD is the second-largest trade union in Denmark, with about 317,000 members.

The Minister of Labour, Ove Hygum, is currently considering how Denmark is to implement the new EU Directive (2000/78/EC) of 27 November 2000 establishing a general framework for equal treatment in employment and occupation [1] (EU0010274F [2]) He would have preferred that the Directive - which prohibits discrimination on grounds of of religion, belief, disability, age or sexual orientation - were implemented by means of collective agreements, as is the tradition in Denmark for the regulation of labour market conditions (DK0001164F [3]). However, in this case supplementary legislation is necessary if the prohibition of discrimination is to be 100% effective. [1] http://europa.eu.int/smartapi/cgi/sga_doc?smartapi!celexapi!prod!CELEXnumdoc&lg=en&numdoc=32000L0078&model=guichett [2] www.eurofound.europa.eu/ef/observatories/eurwork/articles/undefined/council-reaches-political-agreement-on-framework-anti-discrimination-directive [3] www.eurofound.europa.eu/ef/observatories/eurwork/articles/undefined-working-conditions/danish-model-maintained-by-implementation-of-eu-directives-through-collective-agreements

The Confederation of Danish Trade Unions (Landsorganisationen i Danmark, LO) is ready to discuss the inclusion of clauses on flexible working time arrangements in a larger number of collective agreements. It believes that considerations of family life and health should be better combined with individual employees' wishes relating to when and how much they work. LO sees flexibility as more or less a life-long process: young people may easily work up to 50 hours per week - as is typically seen in the information technology sector - and in return it should be possible for them to work fewer hours when they have children and/or become older. It should be possible to deduct the hours saved up during the early part of working life from weekly working time when the need arises. Normal weekly hours should remain at 37.