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12 April, 2013After a long set of negotiations, Swedish industrial workers and employers reached an agreement for wages to rise 6.8 per cent over the next three years.
The industry national collective agreements were reached between the Teknikföretagen employers group, and IndustriALL Global Union affiliates, IF Metall, Unionen, and the Swedish Association of Graduate Engineers (Sveriges Ingenjörer) and the agreements cover over 500,000 workers.
Sweden's industrial workers will see their salaries raised by 6.8 per cent over a 3 year period. The distribution of the 6.8 per cent varies between the different agreements.
In addition to the wage increase, the national agreements contain a development of the parental insurance. The insurance will cover 10 per cent of the wage loss during parental leave and the period is increased from 5 to 6 months. This development is part of an agreement covering all blue-collar workers union within the trade union confederation, LO, and is estimated to be the biggest development of eliminating the differences between female and male wages during many years. The agreement also allows for more flexibility in setting working hours and better and simpler overtime rules.
This national industry agreement, which runs until March 2016, also serves as an example for the rest of the Swedish labour market and the national collective negotiations to follow during 2013. IndustriALL affiliate IF Metall have 43 national collective agreements, and with these first 7 agreements signed, 36 agreements remain to be negotiated and signed during the national bargaining round, ending in November 2013.