EMF holds fifth collective bargaining conference

In October 2005, the European Metalworkers’ Federation (EMF) held a collective bargaining conference, focusing on three key issues: collective bargaining coordination; the reduction of precarious employment; and the launch of a common demand on an individual right to training.

The European Metalworkers’ Federation (EMF) held its fifth collective bargaining conference (EU0108241F) in Rome on 11-12 October 2005. The conference was attended by more than 220 delegates, who spent the two days discussing the collective bargaining situation in the European metalworking industry. Specific areas of debate were EMF’s wage coordination rule, a resolution on precarious employment and a first EMF common demand for an individual right to training.

Collective bargaining coordination

EMF first agreed on a 'wage norm' for the metalworking industry in 1998 at its collective bargaining conference in Frankfurt (DE9812283F). The aim was to strengthen collective bargaining coordination between trade unions in different European countries and to prevent a downward wage spiral in the context of increased globalisation and the introduction of the euro single currency, which was a particular preoccupation at that time. A collective bargaining network for the European metalworking industry - Eucoba - was also set up to provide EMF with information on bargaining in individual European countries.

The 2005 congress discussed and evaluated the operation of this collective bargaining coordination policy. An EMF [report](http://www.emf-fem.org/conference/Roma/Microsoft Word - Report Eval coord rule_EN.pdf), prepared for the conference, noted that the past few years have witnessed difficult developments in terms of collective bargaining, with employers demanding increased wage flexibility and lower wage increases. EMF believes that the way to counter this is to try to establish more solidarity and to find new ways to help EMF member organisations. Delegates voiced their support for this collective bargaining rule.

EMF believes that Eucoba is developing and improving continuously: 'Eucoba is still not perfect but this is the right way to keep everyone in the European unions informed'. EMF noted that it needs more active contact people in every country so as to provide high levels of good-quality information.

EMF highlighted the 'surprising' absence of an increase in transnational trade union cooperation in recent years, although it stresses that this kind of cooperation is possible 'only if companies are situated closely to one another and if workers really have the same problems and can do something together. For example: if they have the same employer or similar products or workers move across borders all the time, then shop stewards need cooperation and think it is reasonable to try to find solutions together.'

Special mention was made of the Finnish paper workers’ strike earlier in 2005 (FI0507201N), with EMF stating that many European paper workers’ unions promised support, but only the unions in Sweden took industrial action (SE0506102N): 'In principle almost everybody says that solidarity action is a good idea, but when they have to do something concrete it is suddenly not easy anymore.' EMF also noted that transnational collective bargaining is a complicated and difficult issue and that it is problematic for national trade unions to transfer their bargaining power to EMF.

Resolution on precarious employment

The conference agreed on a [resolution](http://www.emf-fem.org/conference/Roma/Microsoft Word - Resolution Precarious Employment_EN.pdf) drafted by EMF on 'precarious' employment and the promotion of decent work. In this document, EMF states that it is concerned about the 'dramatically changing composition' of the European labour market, with the erosion of open-ended and full-time jobs, which are classified as 'typical' forms of employment. It also noted that many employers are pursuing policies of demanding more flexibility from their workforce and outsourcing non-core elements of their business operations, such as maintenance, cleaning, clerical jobs or information technology services. EMF notes that these strategies are increasingly accompanied by the use of precarious forms of employment and temporary employment agencies, which are often able to supply cheaper labour on an ad hoc basis.

EMF states that it accepts that its affiliates will be obliged to negotiate on flexible forms of work organisation, but it rejects any situation where this is unilaterally imposed on workers. It also believes that precarious forms of employment and the use of subcontractors undermines collective bargaining, social democracy and the 'European social model', on which there is currently a significant level of debate.

In this resolution, EMF calls on its affiliates, the European Commission, the European Council of Ministers and the national governments of the EU Member States to work towards promoting decent work and reducing precarious employment, using means at their disposal, such as collective bargaining, legislation and labour market policy.

Common demand on the right to training

The conference launched EMF’s first common demand- for an individual right to training, guaranteed by collective agreement. EMF states that training is an 'essential tool' in the EU’s new employment strategy and in a knowledge-based society and can also help to safeguard the European social model.

The common demand is made up of the following elements:

• an individual right to training and lifelong learning for all employees of a company;

• a minimum of five days of training for all employees;

• the drawing up of an annual training plan for all employees, setting out that employee’s training needs and the goals of the company;

• vocational training must be free for the employee and access to the training must be provided during normal working hours, unless otherwise stipulated by collective agreement;

• collective agreements should set out a clear framework of access to lifelong learning and education in domains other than those that are vocationally required, looking specifically at funding;

• after participating in training, employees should receive certification of their training and qualification, regardless of whether this is achieved through training or experience;

• training should be a right in the case of restructuring and dismissal;

• collective agreements should provide clear frameworks for training unemployed people and the funding of this training, so as to reduce the mismatch between employment possibilities and the available workforce in the metalworking sector; and

• trade union representatives at company level must be involved in the entire training process.

The common demand will be implemented in three stages:

• the first stage is agreement on the political goals, such as qualitative and quantitative indicators, a timeframe (four years) and an evaluation procedure at the October conference. A special common demand website will also be built;

• the second stage is translation of EMF’s objectives into national implementation policy by affiliates. National affiliates will send their implementation plans to EMF by the end of January 2006; and

• the third stage is evaluation and 'benchmarking', which the EMF collective bargaining policy committee will undertake. It will produce an implementation report, resulting in proposals on criteria for the selection of good practices and their further development.

The issue of training will therefore feature in EMF-affiliated trade union demands over the coming years.

Commentary

The regular EMF collective bargaining conference is an important event in the metalworking sector trade unions’ calendar, as it discusses, evaluates and sets future collective bargaining policy in this sector. Measures aimed at increasing collective bargaining coordination in this key industry have been in place for some seven years now, and the 2005 conference was an important forum to discuss the development of this process. In general, it would appear that increased cooperation is taking shape although, by EMF’s own admission, there is still room for improvement.

Further, trade unions have been facing a difficult climate in recent years, due to intense bouts of restructuring in the metalworking industry and employer demands for increased levels of flexibility in the areas of pay and working time. EMF has pledged to develop its coordination and cooperation activities further so as to secure purchasing power and acceptable terms and conditions for workers in the European metalworking industry.

The growth of precarious forms of work is also a trend that EMF has pledged to fight, calling on all actors - its affiliates, EU institutions and national governments - to take actions within their power to provide employees with secure and decent work.

Finally, the common demand for an individual right to training can be seen as a landmark in terms of collective bargaining policy. Drawing on the range of good practice in existence around the EU, at national, sectoral and company level, this common demand aims to ensure that all workers have the right to continuous vocational training throughout their careers. This would enable them to keep pace with changing labour market demands and also secure their own professional development on an ongoing basis. This ties in with the goals of the EU's Lisbon strategy, which aims to build a knowledge-based society. (Andrea Broughton, IRS)