World of labour

16 points for the EU Parliament and decision-making bodies to deliver during the 2024-2029 term

• Just Transition (green & digital): “Nobody left behind”. A Just Green& Digital Transition achieved by embedding a culture of engagement of trade unions and civil society in drafting and implementing all relevant investments.
• Fair salaries for decent living standards for All (salary or conflict): “No more working poor!”
• Empowered European Social Dialogue with a balance of power granted, so workers’ representatives can effectively negotiate beneficial terms for workers.
• The right to European actions/strikes must become a fundamental axis towards an EU collective bargaining and a people-oriented EU, where social rights must be at the centre of a new European Social Dialogue and be the foundation of European Works Councils.
• Fighting abusive practices and social dumping: introduction of joint and several liability in subcontracting chains; introduction of a legal obligation to make companies’ compliance with applicable collective bargaining agreements and/or labour law a mandatory award criterion in public procurements; implementation across the EU of ILO Convention No. 81 on labour inspectorates.
• Anticipation to change: re/up-skilling of workers. High social development (in the shape of skills, job security and wages) must be at the centre of an empowered EU autonomy with a position of relative strength, while building a multilateral global economic scenario.
• Fair taxation: achieving a more effective EU fiscal cooperation and fiscal solidarity is a must, together with a more stringent control of the public money given to enterprises, chiefly aimed at redistributing the risks inherent to the current economic turmoil and dispersing it away from citizens and workers.
• Migrant workers welcome on equal terms & conditions: they must be guaranteed the right to work under the legal conditions and rights of the country where they perform the work when not respected by the employer.
• An EU push for public ownership of key companies: (energy, health systems, transport, food…) with the purpose of both reducing existing quasi-monopolistic practices and spreading a scenario where States can regain a balance of power to benefit workers and citizens facing the growing power of private corporations and investment funds.
• Mitigate competition’s undesired effects by avoiding social dumping, bogus self-employment, outsourcing and race to the bottom of salaries (maintaining and enhancing workers’ rights is more than ever necessary).
• Fair and inclusive European welfare system that provides broad and well-organised access to sickness, education and unemployment benefits, thus combining social protection and social investments.
• Mandatory sectoral agreements negotiated by country: in a new EU of the Peoples, there cannot be room left for anti-union practices – therefore collective bargaining must be protected at the highest possible levels, including public procurement.
• Tackling violence and harassment against women everywhere, including at work: many women are affected in one way or another by violence and harassment because of their employment status, the type of work they carry out, or because of the conditions in the sector they work in. Just and fair policies and practices must be implemented to eradicate this scourge.
• Improving working conditions in platform work: those working in the platform economy are workers too! Workers’ rights are not negotiable! All forms of collective representation must be guaranteed so that platform workers can find the most appropriate way to union recognition.
• Fair pension systems across the EU to support retired people: put an end to longer working lives and favour the stabilisation of a general working time reduction.
• The EU needs to deliver a Social Progress Protocol giving priority to workers’ and social rights over economic freedoms, a Protocol to channel the future frame towards an EU of the Peoples.

All the above requests are necessary, but first and foremost Peace is needed to deliver the positive effects of any of them. The TUNE calls for the EU to open all channels for diplomacy and facilitate an immediate round of peace talks. Wars and an arms race will not bring a better world: only dialogue and understanding do.