Collective Bargaining

After final negotiations, the Confederation of Danish Industry (DI) and the Central Organisation of Industrial Employees in Denmark (CO-industri) announced that they had reached an agreement on a three-year renewal of the collective agreement for industry. The new agreement includes amendments to the rules on parental leave. The period of leave with full pay has been extended from a total of 13 weeks to 16 weeks. Together, the Industrial Agreement and the Collective Agreement for Salaried Employees in Industry cover more than 6,000 businesses and 230,000 employees.

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30% of pensioners are at risk of poverty according to Eurostat. This is the fourth-highest rate in the EU. The at-risk-of-poverty rate for pensioners has been rising gradually since 2013, when it was 13%.

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According to Eurostat data, in 2018 women’s pensions in the European Union were on average 30% lower than that of men. However, over time the gender pension gap has decreased and is now four percentage points (pp) smaller compared with 2010. Although women receive lower pensions in all EU Member States, the size of the gap varies widely.

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The Dutch trade union FNV surveyed around 2,000 people in healthcare and concluded that because of staff shortages interns are often used as fully trained healthcare workers despite lacking the necessary experience or training. This situation can cause dangerous situations for patients.

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The Icelandic Confederation of Labour (ASÍ) and the Federation of State and Municipal Employees (BSRB) have agreed to set up a new institute for labour market research. The Varða institute will encourage independent research projects, which might have considerable influence on workers’ wages and employment conditions.

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After nine difficult negotiation meetings, a social plan was signed between Delphi Technologies and the trade union OGBL. In November 2019 a plan had been announced to restructure the group. This plan also implied the relocation of the ‘fuel injection system’ division. Now the number of redundancies has been reduced and a solution was found for those who will be declared redundant.

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Despite some improvements in labour legislation, business service centres and employers are calling for a new law that would reflect current labour market trends. Multinational companies in particular have complained about the changes in labour legislation and the increase of labour costs.

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The general collective agreement for universities expires on 31 March and negotiations for a new agreement have started for its renewal. The Finnish Union of University Researchers and Teachers (FUURT) is being represented in negotiations by JUKO, the Negotiation Organisation for Public Sector Professionals. Other employee representatives in the negotiations are Trade Union Pro and JHL (the trade union for the public and welfare sectors). The employer side is represented by the Finnish Education Employers (FEE). All parties agree with the common goal to make universities great places to work.

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Care workers have gone on strike after employers refused to discuss the possibility of a 35-hour week for the 125,000 employees in the private nursing, health and social sector. The strike was called by GPA-djp (union of private sector employees, graphical workers and journalists) and Vida (transport and services union). The warning strikes were still going on at the end of February.

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Over 21,300 non-EU citizens were working legally in Romania in the first nine months of 2019, twice as many as in the same period in 2018, according to data from the General Inspectorate for Immigration (IGI). Yet 97,000 jobs remained vacant despite managers actively seeking to fill the positions, according to the National Employment Agency.

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