Helsinki (20.07.2017 - Heikki Jokinen) A total of 2,277 employees lost their jobs in Finland during the first half of this year.
The Central Organisation of Finnish Trade Unions SAK has been keeping track of the number of redundancies since 2006 and the figures for the first half of this year are lower than ever.
The previous record on low number of redundancies at a corresponding time was reached in 2007, when the figure was 3,448.
SAK Director of Collective Bargaining, Annika Rönni-Sällinen see the smaller number of redundancies as a sign of stronger confidence in the Finnish economy.
"The national labour market pact that was signed one year ago has brought stability to the labour market and the sectoral collective agreements create evenhanded conditions for company competitiveness", she says.
The biggest redundancies took place in the retail and IT-sectors. The major grocery trade chain Kesko closed several grocery stores it had bought and let 206 people go. The next largest redundancies took place in the software and services company Tieto (178 redundancies), telecommunication and IT company Nokia (170) and telecommunication company Telia Finland (112).
Even the number of people under threat of redundancies was, at the beginning of this year exceptionally low, 3,447 people. Last year the corresponding figure was almost triple that, 9,452.
These figures show the number of employees who have had to go through the mandatory consultation process with regard to possible personnel cuts. The final number of redundancies is usually smaller.
We need security and productivity
Annika Rönni-Sällinen says that the best way to support the positive development in the Finnish economy is to increase security and productivity.
It means investing in people through better training and by continuously developing the functions and services of companies.
The ones who know best how to develop these are employees, she stresses. Therefore they must be consulted and brought on board better than has been the case up to now to develop the functioning and efficiency of companies. They must also have possibilities to have real influence over their work, Rönni-Sällinen says.
The security of employment would be strengthened by, for example, limiting the use of zero-hour contracts and making it easier to facilitate family and working life.
"Secured working hours and livelihood and a possibility to combine work and other parts of life makes for the basis of employee engagement. A company will not succeed without engaged and competent employees."
SAK is collecting the redundancies data from stock exchange releases and other public sources. The figures do not include the municipal sector.
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