Collective Bargaining

It is illegal for companies to use tips as part of an employee’s minimum wage but it is not illegal for them to use tips as part of a stated salary above that. In an attempt to put an end to tips being used as part of the wage, part of the new collective agreement a pledge to be signed by hotel and restaurant owners that they will not use the proceeds of tips to subsidise part of an employee’s wage. The government has stated that it is considering to amend existing laws if the new collective agreement does not solve the issue.

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After an earlier strike action between 15-18 April 2019 fuel-tanker drivers threatened a new strike to back up their demands for better pay and conditions. In the previous stoppage in April 2,000 petrol stations ran low on fuel supplies and government was prompted to declare an energy crisis. This meant reduced airports’ fuel reserves to emergency levels, disrupted flights and forced motorists to queue for hours outside petrol stations. Further strike actions that were planned to happen in May 2019 are called off as negotiations re-opened. According to the unions their demand for a minimum wage of 1,200 euros had not been agreed to but bosses have accepted to raise salaries to very near that figure.

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The average monthly disposable income per household member last year was 394 euro, according to the Ministry of Entrepreneurship and Technology. Over the past four years, disposable income of households for consumption and saving has increased by 22% per person. The improvements were the result of a strong economy and growing social transfers. State benefits for families and children account for 2.7% of GDP.

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Trade union CCOO has called out a national walkout because nursery school teachers are not being paid an adequate salary for their levels of responsibility and training and to protest lack of job security. Salaries in the sector have been frozen for the last seven-and-a-half years. According to union CCO current salaries of fulltime working nursing school teachers do not reach 900 euro a month gross.

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Teachers are often overworked and underpaid. Especially those on part-time contracts, according to the latest report on working time of two trade unions. Every ten years a similar report is published, previous editions dating from 1999 and 2009. The most recent report shows that most teachers spend between 8.6% and 16% extra hours at work. The unions are both demanding paid extra hours for educators, a reduction of compulsory extra education hours for teachers, more resources for the classrooms and more time for educators to interact with parents.

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Although the level of unemployment has fallen for months in a row it is still higher than during the years before the financial and economic crisis. In the actual developments of the economy, unemployment threatens to grow again. To fight unemployment and improve welfare investments in education, climate and social services are necessary.

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The nine largest trade unions of the country, including the General Confederation of Labour (CGT), the French Democratic Confederation of Labour (CFDT) and the Workers' Force (FO), have jointly organised a nationwide strike action on 9 May 2019. With the strike action the unions protested against 120,000 job cuts in the public sector and other deep changes to the countries’ public sector that the government wants to put into effect. In addition to job cuts, medical workers are angry at changes to public hospital financing. Teachers are angry at hiring changes they say will add to workloads. Air traffic controllers were also involved in the strike action leading to the cancellation of about 30% of the scheduled flights.

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Trade union Fórsa warns that the government will face claims for special pay rises of 6% for public service workers as compensation if it does not roll back additional working hours introduced after the economic crisis. According to Fórsa the additional working hours which were put in place for public service personnel in 2013 were worth about 6% in rough figures. The union states that if the additional working hours are not reversed, it is inevitable that unions would lodge productivity claims.

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Job quality is increasingly recognised as a major policy concern. It is central to the ILO’s Decent Work Agenda and to the European Union’s Quality of Work policies. The ILO and Eurofound published a report together that offers a comparative overview of results from the most recent surveys on working conditions available across the world. In the report, that covers approximately 1.2 billion of the world’s workers, seven dimensions of job quality are covered: the physical environment, work intensity, working time quality, the social environment, skills and development, prospects, and earnings, finding both important differences and similarities between countries.

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Amazon workers were on strike this week, demanding a collective agreement that includes a living wage and safer jobs. Workers at warehouses in Rheinberg, Werne, Bad Hersfeld, Koblenz, and Leipzig have walked out off the job. Union Ver.di demands that the collective bargaining agreements in the retail sector finally be declared universally binding in order to reverse the dramatic erosion of collective bargaining. The strike was preceded by a gathering of Amazon workers from 16 countries. According to UNI Global Union the fight against Amazon’s corporate greed is one of the most important labour struggles in recent history.

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