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8 September, 2002Metalworkers will join forces with the construction workers' union by the year 2004.
SWITZERLAND: On September 7, 2002, delegates attending the extraordinary congresses of the IMF-affiliated Swiss metalworkers' union SMUV/FTMH and the construction workers' union SIB agreed by a large majority the merger of their two organisations. It is expected the official launch of the new federation, to be called the Interprofessional Trade Union (Syndicat interprofessionnel, or SIP), will be in 2004.
With this merger, divisions separating industrial sectors and job occupations will disappear. The metalworkers' union says that the merged organisation will not only have a more efficient, united, forward-looking structure, but it will also be a real political and social force in Switzerland, to serve as a "counterweight to neo-liberal power" in the country.
The SIP will be the largest trade union in Switzerland, with a membership of 200,000.
Another trade union merger on the horizon, in Austria in 2005, is planned between the IMF-affiliated Metal and Textile Workers' Union (already a merger) with the Agricultural and Food Workers' Union, the Private Employees' Union, the Print, Journalism and Paper Workers' Union and the Chemical Workers' Union.