International Labour Organisation reviewing Ictu-backed complaint
OPINION: FOR THE first time in a quarter of a century, the International Labour Organisation's committee on freedom of association is reviewing a complaint against Ireland. The Irish Congress of Trade Unions lodged this complaint with the international labour movement's full support.
We at the ILO welcome the Irish Government’s pledge to “reform the law on employees’ right to engage in collective bargaining, to ensure compliance . . . with recent judgments of the European Court of Human Rights”, as contained in the programme for government.
Changes are necessary, not only to respect international norms, but to bolster Ireland’s tenuous economic recovery through a better distribution of income.
Ireland is facing a complaint at the ILO because its laws do not adequately protect workers’ rights. In particular, employers establish and control “employee representative councils” to avoid recognising legitimate trade unions that employees have joined. Such practices violate the right to organise and collective bargaining in the ILO convention, which Ireland ratified in 1955.
Similarly, the European Court of Human Rights has ruled that it is illegal to offer employees financial incentives to surrender trade union rights. It has also ruled that workers have a right to be represented by their trade union in employment matters and that collective bargaining – workers negotiating collectively with their employer – is a fundamental human right.
The real issue is that Ireland’s domestic laws fail to prevent employers from penalising workers who engage in collective bargaining, establishing phony “employee associations,” or refusing to recognise a trade union that employees have joined.
Ireland’s economic vulnerability before the financial crisis was largely based on private-sector borrowing, speculative construction, inadequate financial regulation and ultra-low corporate taxes. A durable economic recovery will require consumer demand funded by employment income rather than borrowing and speculation. Attempts to undermine wages and wage-setting mechanisms would undermine consumer spending and the prospects for a recovery.
By contrast, improving labour law to better protect labour rights would help workers to negotiate wage rises as productivity rises.
A sustainable economy depends on workers being able to purchase the output they produce. Extending collective bargaining to more workplaces would help to drive economic growth.
Recent experience supports the view that trade unions improve economic performance. Countries with deregulated labour markets and legal obstacles to union organising, such as the US and Ireland, have suffered the largest increases in unemployment.
By contrast, countries with higher levels of unionisation and social security have generally fared better. For example, Germany’s strong labour market institutions allowed unions and employers to negotiate temporary cuts in working time instead of job losses. As a result, its jobless rate barely rose during the crisis and it is well positioned to increase output during the recovery.
Ireland should reform its labour laws to better protect employees from anti-union discrimination, stop employer interference in workers’ organisations, and promote collective bargaining. These improvements are needed to meet international standards Ireland has signed on to. They would both benefit Irish workers and strengthen the Irish economy.
SHARAN BURROW
is general secretary of the International Trade Union Confederation, which represents 175 million workers in 150 countries, including the Irish Congress of Trade Unions. She will speak at Ictu’s three-day biennial delegate conference, which opens today in Killarney, Co Kerry