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18 June, 2007
The Finnish Chemical Workers Union, Kemianliitto, signed a new national labour agreement on 8 June with chemical employers. The 30-month accord, coming 15 weeks before a current, two-year agreement is set to expire, covers 20,000 workers in Finland’s chemicals, plastics, oil, and petrochemical industries.
It provides for wage increases that are substantially higher than the country’s predicted 2% inflation rate will be.
On 12 June, Kemianliitto finished negotiations with rubber sector employers on a similar contract, covering 2,000 rubber workers. And, last night, 17 June, Finland’s Union of Salaried Employees’ Union, Toimihenkilöunioni, began bargaining with the same employers for a renewal contract to replace the one expiring on 30 September 2007, applying to 6,500 white-collar workers in the chemicals industries.
Both Kemanianlitto and Toimihenkilöunioni are ICEM affiliates.
The pact for the 20,000 blue-collar workers includes an immediate bonus this month of between €250 and €305. On 1 October 2007, a pay increase of 3.4% was won, and another 2.5% is due in September 2008. Industry workers will receive a third percentage increase of 2.5% in May 2009, with the contract expiring on 31 January 2010. Additionally, the package includes performance-related increases for 2008 and 2009 that will be negotiated at plant-level, and which should result in a 0.4% bonus each year.
The 8 June accord was the first in this round of bargaining under Finland’s incomes policy agreement. The strength of the wage package makes it clear that workers were not harmed by certain industrial employer associations, which chose to forego income policy bargaining at the national confederation level, i.e. centralised bargaining across all Finnish work sectors, and instead, sought national bargaining on a sector-by-sector basis.