Employers extend paper industry lockout in Finland

Negotiations on terms of employment in the Finnish pulp and paper industry continue to be bogged down. Representatives of the Finnish Paperworkers' Union and the Finnish Forest Industries Federation met twice at the start of this week, but talks were broken off on Tuesday afternoon with no progress made. They may continue next week if National Conciliator chooses to convene a further meeting of parties to the dispute.

On Tuesday afternoon the Finnish Forest Industries Federation announced that it would further extend its lockout in the industry. This measure interrupting work and wages in pulp and paper mills has now continued for more than four weeks. The extension will follow on from the end of the present lockout period at the end of June, and will last until 6 July unless a settlement is reached.

The dispute over terms of employment in the pulp and paper industry has now continued for more than six months. It began in late November when the Finnish Forest Industries Federation announced that it would not abide by a comprehensive incomes policy settlement covering more that 80 per cent of employees in Finland. The Finnish Paperworkers' Union was prepared to accept the terms of service offered by the national settlement. By contrast, the employers made several proposals to reduce the benefits provided to employees by the existing collective agreement, including an end to production shutdowns at pulp and paper mills over the Christmas and Midsummer holidays and deregulation of the use of outside labour.

As a counter-measure to the lockout, the Finnish Paperworkers' Union is now calling limited strikes in certain minor branches of the pulp and paper industry that are not affected by the lockout. Several trade unions affiliated to the Central Organisation of Finnish Trade Unions &#;8211 SAK are also embarking on sympathetic action in support of the Paperworkers' Union. This includes action by the Finnish Aviation Union, the Chemical Workers' Union, Service Union United – PAM, the Construction Trade Union and the Finnish Electrical Workers' Union. Supportive measures will primarily target work that is covered by the lockout and work that is normally performed during mill shutdowns.

Trade unions in Sweden have also continued to support the Finnish paperworkers. The Swedish pulp and paper industry union Pappers has declared an overtime ban at the mills of Stora Enso, Metsä-Tissue, M-real and Ahlström in Sweden. The Swedish construction, engineering, electrical and wood and forestry sector trade unions have also announced that they will support this measure by refusing to perform any work that is covered by the overtime ban.