Labour confederations set pay targets

All three of Finland's employee confederations have now announced their objectives for pay rises in 2005 and 2006. The salaried employee confederation STTK and the academic professional confederation AKAVA specified their objectives for the current round of national incomes policy bargaining on Wednesday, and the blue collar confederation SAK declared its corresponding pay ambitions on Thursday.

STTK and AKAVA are seeking pay rises amounting to 3.0 per cent of payroll costs in 2005, while SAK is demanding a 3.1 per cent wage increase. All three organisations are also pressing for a 2.7 per cent rise in 2006.

In the model proposed by AKAVA, the pay rises would take the form of an equal percentage increase for each bargaining sector as a whole. It would then be up to each sector to negotiate on how to share out this increase across industry salary scales. If no agreement could be reached, then the increases would be paid as a flat-rate salary rise across the board.

STTK, on the other hand, is seeking pay rises comprising a general pay increase coupled with an allowance for various union bargaining sectors and a gender equality allowance. The general pay increase would amount to 2.3 percentage points in each year. The union bargaining sector allowance envisaged by STTK would be 0.4 percentage points next year and 0.2 percentage points in 2006. STTK is calling for an allowance to promote gender equality amounting to 0.3 percentage points in 2005 and 0.2 percentage points in the following year.

In the pay rise model proposed by SAK there would be a general increase of 28 cents per hour or 47 euros per month in the first year and 29 cents per hour or 48 euros per month in the second year. The payroll cost impact of this general increase would be 2.2 per cent in both years. SAK envisages a slightly larger union bargaining sector allowance than STTK, with 0.6 percentage points next year and 0.5 percentage points in 2006. The SAK bargaining target also incorporates a gender equality allowance of 0.3 percentage points in 2005.

Taken together with upcoming adjustments to income taxation and social security contributions and wage slides, the overall pay settlement sought by SAK would mean an increase of about 42 euros in the take-home pay of an employee currently earning 2,500 euros per month.

All three employee confederations expect the government to support the comprehensive incomes policy settlement by cutting income taxes.

Slight progress in qualitative issues

Negotiations have been going on since the beginning of November regarding the working life quality objectives of the labour confederations. A settlement has already been reached on the objectives for gender equality and training. Fairly considerable progress has also been made towards a scheme to improve the situation of employees threatened with redundancy. However, the employers continue to resist such aspects as increasing the financial liabilities of enterprises that dismiss employees on collective grounds.

Good progress has been made towards improved training opportunities for elected employee representatives. On the other hand, hardly any agreement was reached in negotiations seeking to improve the access of shop stewards to information from their employers and to reinforce the status of labour protection delegates. Efforts to increase subscriber liability and to secure an independent right of locus standi for trade unions have also enjoyed little success.

Negotiators on both sides are now anticipating a very busy weekend, as both the employee and the employer confederations are seeking to reach a final accord by Monday morning. The board of SAK is due to meet again at 09.30 on Monday 29 November.

More information about the incomes policy negotiations in Finnish:
www.sak.fi/tupo.