SAK 18th Congress gets underway in Tampere

Youth well represented in several union delegations

SAK's 18th Congress has opened at Tampere Hall. The affiliated unions, which make up the Confederation are represented by 270 delegates, coming from various regions of the country. One delegate lives as far north as Kilpisjärvi, in Northern Lapland, whereas 12 per cent of the delegates come from Helsinki. Three delegates have immigrant backgrounds.

SAK's largest member organization the Trade Union for the Public and Welfare Sectors JHL has, with its 53 delegates, the largest delegation. The Service Union United PAM has 49 delegates and the Metalworkers' Union 36. Each one of the smallest unions has only one representative.

There are 18 delegates under 30 years of age. Nine unions have delegates belonging to this age group. The youngest participant is a 22-year old delegate from the Construction Trade Union. 27 per cent of the union's delegates are under 30 years of age. Also, the Service Union United PAM has several young people in its delegation. The 64-year old representative of the Theatre and Media employees in Finland is the oldest delegate.

Men are in the majority, and account for 63 per cent of the delegates. Unions that have a female majority have more women than men in their delegations. 73 per cent of the JHL delegates are women and 69 per cent of the PAM delegates. All male delegations represent the Railway Workers' Union, the Electrical Workers' Union and a few small unions that have only one or two delegates.

A third of the delegates (34 per cent) come from the manufacturing industry and a quarter from both the public sector (25 per cent) and the private service sector (24 per cent).

Over 90 per cent of all work full-time in permanent employment relations. 4 per cent are part-time and/or fixed-time employees and one of the delegates belongs to the self-employed category. 3 per cent have no employment at all.

Large work places rule. About half of the delegates work at places that employ over 100 employees. 7 per cent of the delegates come from small work places, employing less than 10 persons.

Almost half of the delegates work as head shop stewards and a fifth as ordinary shop stewards. One in seven is a safety representative at his or her work organization.

The delegates represent 153 vocations varying from dockers or stevedores to environmental instructors. There are among the delegates many sales assistants and vendors, representing PAM, and several carpenters, representing either the Construction Trade Union or JHL.

It should be mentioned too that 24 international guests are also participating in the Congress which is the pre-eminent decision making organ of SAK and is held once every five years. The Congress will last until Wednesday June 8.

Photos from SAK's Congress (Flickr)