Improving coordination of collective bargaining in Europe (2008)

Description

How EMCEF affiliates could help improve coordination on collective bargaining issues was the theme of an ETUI-Education seminar that brought together representatives of trade unions from 6 EU countries. The introduction provided an overview of how collective bargaining systems work in the EMCEF sectors in terms of the levels and sorts of topics covered (more details on the worker participation website below). In discussing how to approach transnational agreements at company level the participants agreed that such agreements should not undermine any collective rights acquired and established at national level and that trade unions should be informed and consulted whenever demands for negotiation of such agreements arose. Discussions were also held on: the sort of principles trade unions could apply in order to protect the rights of older workers both at work and in terms of their pensions; improving the involvement of trade unions in national initial vocational education and training (IVET); and the Eucob@n Collective Bargaining Report 2007 (with ETUI researchers).