Collective Bargaining

The new WSI Minimum Wage Report provides an overview of current developments in minimum wages both in Europe and elsewhere. The report is part of a series that is published annually since 2009. It draws on the WSI Minimum Wage Database that holds time series data for 37 countries, including all 22 of the current 28 EU Member States with a statutory minimum wage. Data is also held on seven EU neighbours (Albania, Macedonia, Moldova, Russia, Serbia, Turkey and Ukraine) and eight developed and industrialising economies in the rest of the world (Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Japan, Korea, Canada, New Zealand and USA). The report shows that minimum wages in most EU countries were increased at the start of 2019, with a median increase of 4.8 % compared with the previous year, continuing the recent trends towards faster minimum wage growth.

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As part of a deal to address pay inequality, more than 60,000 public servants will gradually see pay improvements. The new arrangements are set to benefit more than 60,000 employees, including more than 16,000 teachers, almost 10,000 nurses and around 5,000 Special Needs Assistants. These public servants were recruited in times of economic crisis and therefore were faced with pay scales for all new entrants being slashed by 10%. The pay increases that, starting this months, will gradually come into effect are about 3300 euro on average. These increases come on top of pay rises already scheduled under the public service pay agreement. Some trade unions have rejected the wage improvement deal on the grounds that it did not restore full pay equality.

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Unions declare strike actions at the national air traffic services provider until March 23, 2019 because the demands of the workers (a list of 25 points, including requests for career interruption, promotions and bonuses) are not heard. Already at the beginning of the month problems arose due to many sick leaves. Later during the month actions disrupted work in the control centres. On March 22, 2019 the Christian union ACV/CSC-Transcom, representing a part of the air traffic controllers at Skeyes, toughened its actions despite proposals by management. The actions resulted in “relatively small disturbances” for passengers and cargo flights. Despite an agreement with the socialist union the actions were prolonged until at least the end of the month with great support from a majority of the controllers.

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While representatives of employers and trade union Verdi were engaged in the third round of negotiations, thousands of public sector employees went on strike. Verdi and the civil servants' association DBB are demanding a salary increase of 6% for state employees, with a minimum of at least 200 euros more per month. This warning strike was preceded and will probably be followed by several other strikes. Negotiations will proceed in March 2019.

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About 500 ambulance workers are participating in a two-day strike from 7 AM to 5 PM, in an ongoing dispute over trade union representation rights and the deduction of union subscriptions at source from their wages. The striking ambulance workers’ union is the National Ambulance Service Representative Association (Nasra) that is part of the Psychiatric Nurses Association (PNA) but this union is not recognised by management as a representative body for ambulance personnel. The ambulance workers already held two previous work stoppages in recent weeks as part of a campaign to get their union recognised. According to the general secretary of the PNA the ambulance workers believe so strongly that they should be able to join the union of their choice and be represented by that union that they are willing to take this two day action and to take further action.

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The government wants to cut down employment benefits for the highest income groups. Unemployment benefits in the country are normally negotiated with trade unions and constitute on average 68% of a worker’s previous wages. This means that if highly paid workers lose their job they can get unemployment benefits up to 7700 euro a month. The average amount of unemployment benefits, however, lies around 1200 a month. The government defends its plans to reduce the amount of employment benefits by comparing the countries’ policies with other OECD nations than on average pay only 56% of the last earned wages in employment benefits. With the new austerity plans the government wants to save up to 3.9 billion euros over three years.

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Workers from a number of sectors went on strike to enforce the unions’ demand to raise wages by 1.4% and improve working conditions, including old age pensions. The strike paralyzed parts of the public sector and traffic, like airports. Dockworkers in Antwerp also laid down their tools to support the demands. The united union movement regarded the strike a success. On 26 February 2019 an agreement was reached between unions and employers which includes a wage raise of 1.1%. Members will vote for or against the agreement next month.

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Hundreds of facilities workers at the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) and the Ministry of Justice, who earn as little as 7.83 pound an hour, joined cleaners from the University of London in a 1-day strike against outsourcing, which they say exposes them to insecurity and discrimination. Cleaners, security, catering staff and others represented by the PCS union are demanding the living wage, equal terms and conditions and an end to outsourcing. Cleaners and security officers from are demanding the living wage, and cleaners from the University of London who already won better pay and conditions, are demanding equal terms and conditions with directly employed staff. The strike is timed to coincide with a ruling on a landmark case on collective bargaining that could empower the UK’s 3.3 million outsourced workers to negotiate directly with their companies buying the outsourced services – as well as their direct employers.

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Unemployment in December 2018 was the lowest in almost ten years, calculated Statistics Poland. Despite a slight increase to 6.1% in January the government expects unemployment to fall by the end of this year. Government expects the economy to grow 3.8% t in 2019, with an inflation targeted at 2.3%.

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Around 50% of Ryanair cabin crew in Belgium used to be employed by Crewlink, a subcontractor of the Irish low-cost airline. Ryanair has announced that the workers concerned will be offered to sign an employment contract with Ryanair itself. According to the unions Crewlink was working with even worse employment conditions than those of Ryanair. A part of the staff that was employed by Crewlink did not even have a minimum number of guaranteed working hours and therefore had no minimum financial security. Furthermore, since 31 January 2019 Belgian labour law is applied to pilots and cabin crew that are directly employed by Ryanair. This means that the two main demands that led to last summer’s strikes are now met.

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