Trade Union News from Finland
Tekijä (09.10.2024 - Heikki Jokinen) Riku Aalto, president of the Industrial Union, says that the anti-worker policy of the Finnish Government is creating extra pressures for collective bargaining this autumn. The goal of the union is to improve its members' purchasing power.
The collective bargaining for the technology industry began on 12 September. The existing collective agreement will expire at the end of November.
This time the negotiations will be different. The Orpo-Purra right-wing Government has amended several laws in a way which serves to act against the interests of wage and salary earners. And there’s more to come.
Tekijä (09.10.2024 - Heikki Jokinen) In September, the Orpo-Purra Government published its proposal for local bargaining for company level agreements. This proposal opens the gates for dumping the terms of work.
Up until now, company level bargaining has been based on nationwide collective agreements. It is only allowed for the union shop stewards and the companies belonging to the employers' association.
Now, the right-wing Government is extending the right for local bargaining to all companies. Also, someone other than the union shop steward could make a deal on behalf of employees.
Tekijä (11.09.2024 - Heikki Jokinen) In Finnish political history, there has seldom been, if ever, any proposed legislation that has come in for such fierce criticism as the new proposal for amendment of the Aliens Act by the right-wing Orpo-Purra Government.
As always, new bill proposals are sent out for comments that may be submitted by all interested parties. These are published on the website lausuntopalvelu.fi.
One of the key proposals concerns the holder of a residence permit issued based on employment. Should he or she become unemployed, according to the dream of the right-wing Government, he or she must leave Finland with their family in three months, if the residence permit has been valid for under two years.
Tekijä (11.09.2024 - Heikki Jokinen) The Industrial Union sees no grounds for the Government proposal for amendments in the Alien Act. Nor are the planned changes reasonable. The draft does not answer the needs of society and is based on an inadequate understanding on how the labour market works.
The proposed three months time to find new employment is too short for anyone, the union says. Especially difficult for a person coming from abroad.
Lack of networks and language skills, insufficient knowledge of how Finnish society works and discrimination when it comes to recruiting hinder finding employment. The risk to use illegal paid employment services or to grab other suspicious jobs will grow, the union stresses.
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