Finnish employees to stage Day of Action for jobs on 12 December

Finland's employee organisations are to challenge the employers to a debate on the social responsibility of enterprises

On Friday 12 December the country's three employee confederations SAK, STTK and AKAVA are to organise a joint Day of Action for jobs and a mass demonstration against collective dismissals. The Day of Action comes in response to a year-long wave of layoffs and redundancies. Many major companies have seen their stock prices soar after announcing massive redundancies, even as owners and senior management have enjoyed generous dividends and handsome pay rises.

The Day of Action is an attempt by employee organisations to challenge employers to improve the social responsibility of their enterprises, and to engage them in a debate on ways of improving job security, maintaining employee skills and motivation, and achieving fair play and genuine co-operation in the workplace.

A further aim of the Day of Action is to accelerate reforms in workplace codetermination legislation with a view to imposing firmer statutory obligations on employers to take responsibility for their workers.

Implementation of the Day of Action will vary according to the employee confederation, trade union and workplace concerned. The principal objective of SAK is to encourage workplace dialogue between employees and senior management so that all employees are able to express their concerns and moral indignation in the course of the Day of Action. Other plans for the Day of Action include street events and the collection of signatures on a mass petition for jobs.