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UNIONS

Builders’ strike called off

A builders' strike has been called off after unions reached agreement with employers on a new national pay and conditions package.

Published: 24 April 2007 08:31 CEST

“We’ve had to compromise a lot, but that’s how it is in circumstances like these, when you’ve got industrial action taking place,” said Bo Antoni, CEO of the Swedish Construction Federation.

Byggnads last week rejected a proposed agreement put forward by mediators, saying that the proposed wage increases in the deal were less than agreed industry norms. It called a strike for 800 workers for Peab, a large Swedish constructor. A further 1,500 workers at JM, NCC and Skanska had been due to walk out on 27th April.

According to the Swedish Construction Federation the new agreement is in line with that put forward last week, giving a 10.2 percent average wage increase over three years.

Nonetheless, employers caved in on a number of points, including a reduction in working time of one day a year in 2008 and one day in 2009.

Employers scored an important victory by keeping so-called inspection fees out of the agreement.

Inspection fees of 1.5 percent of wages are charged by Byggnads both to members and non-members, the purpose of which is to ensure that employers are paying the right wages. The fees to non-members were ruled illegal by the European Court of Human Rights earlier this year.

“The judgment said that we should be more transparent when we accounted for how the money was used,” said Byggnads chairman Hans Tilly.

“We found a model that suited us, but we felt that the employers kept putting a spanner in the works. We have therefore simply taken the inspection fees out of the agreement,” he said.

“But this doesn’t mean that we will stop checking that the right wage is being paid to members. That will remain an important question for us.”

Byggnads has said it will now raise membership fees by 155 kronor a month in order to cover the loss of the inspection fees. Employers also agreed that they would hand Byggnads details of the wages of all workers, whether members of the union or not.

Despite agreeing to the measure, the Swedish Construction Federation said it was “very dubious from a data protection standpoint.”

Peab, the only company to be hit by the strike, said it was not particularly happy with the agreement.

“We don’t need more bureaucracy in the workplace, which is what this is going to lead to,” said spokesman Gösta Sjöström.

WORKING IN GERMANY

German steelworkers agree 6.5 percent pay hike after strike

Tens of thousands of steel workers in western Germany will get a 6.5-percent pay hike this year - the biggest jump in three decades - in a settlement that could set the tone for industry as inflation soars.

Published: 15 June 2022 12:37 CEST
German steelworkers agree 6.5 percent pay hike after strike

The agreed increase would come into effect “from August 1st”, the IG Metall union in the region of North Rhine-Westphalia said in a statement Wednesday.

The 68,000 steelworkers in the industrial region would also receive a one-off payment of 500 euros for the months of June and July, the union said.

The outcome of the negotiations was “the biggest increase in wages in the steel industry in percentage terms in 30 years,” said IG Metall boss, Joerg Hofmann.

Germany’s largest union, IG Metall launched a strike action at steelworks in the west in May after management failed to meet its demands for an 8.2 percent pay increase.

On Thursday at the peak of the movement, around 16,000 workers across 50 firms downed tools, the union said.

READ ALSO: Should foreign workers join a German union?

“Rising inflation” and the “good economic situation” of the steel industry were the basis for IG Metall’s demands.

Consumer prices rose at a 7.9-percent rate in Germany in May, a record for the country since reunification in 1990 driven by the outbreak of the war in Ukraine.

The smaller number of steelworkers in the east of Germany, who are also seeking an 8.2 percent pay boost, have yet to reach their own agreement.

Negotiations are currently taking place in a number of sectors. In the textile industry, 12,000 workers in the east of Germany sealed a 5.6 percent pay increase at the beginning of May.

Meanwhile, negotiations covering the auto industry, and mechanical and electrical engineering will begin in November.

Despite the agreed rise the onus was still on government to relieve the pressure on workers form rising prices “in the coming months”, IG Metall boss Hofmann said.

Significant wage demands have prompted concerns of a wage-price spiral, where rising pay sustains higher inflation.

The European Central Bank last week said it would raise its interest rates for the first time in over a decade this July as it seeks to stamp out price rises.

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