More than 100,000 workers will strike against the government on Thursday and Friday (February 1-2). Yle (Finland’s public broadcaster) likened the impact of the strike to that of a general strike.
On Thursday, SAK and STTK (Finland’s two main central trade union organizations) are also organizing a large joint demonstration under the slogan “Stop it now!” At Senate Square in Helsinki.
This week’s strikes and joint demonstrations are a necessary escalation of the months-long struggle against Finland’s blue-brown government.
Behind the government is the employers’ association EK, which is equivalent to the Federation of Swedish Enterprises. It is primarily an employer program that the government wants to implement.
Decisions have already been taken to significantly reduce unemployment benefits, which will reduce compensation for unemployed workers by more than one month’s salary.
The benefit cuts will be followed by making it easier for employers to lay off employees, as well as cutting housing benefits and introducing waiting periods for sickness insurance. In addition to attacks on welfare, the government wants to restrict the right to strike, increase strike fines, weaken the position of trade union representatives and introduce anti-labor “marks” for wage increases similar to those in Sweden. There is.
The latter is a blow to trade unions’ right to freely negotiate wages for their members. . At the time of writing (Tuesday, January 30th), a number of trade unions have announced political strikes, and the number is likely to increase in the coming days.
The first strike could begin as early as January 31 with daycare and school staff on strike, followed by a series of strikes by both workers and civil servants. Some academic unions, such as the Tehy Medical Union, are also planning to take part in the protests on February 1-2.
Japan’s largest labor union, the Industrial Labor Union, announced that more than 60,000 union members will go on strike at 700 workplaces across the country from February 1st to 2nd. Service trade union PAM has laid off tens of thousands of workers in the retail, hotel and restaurant, real estate and cleaning sectors, while public sector union JHL’s strike has halted much of public transport, port operations and air travel. ing.
Strikes are inevitable as the government continues to push through the brutal deterioration of working life and refuses to negotiate with workers. Government reforms only benefit employers. This is not surprising since the government’s program is a copy of the policy objectives of the Confederation of Finnish Industry and other employers’ organizations.
“The government does not negotiate, it orders. The consequences of this policy are now being seen in the form of large-scale strikes,” says JHL acting president Håkan Ekström.
Following the political strike on February 1st and 2nd, Akava, the Finnish professional and managerial trade union federation, carried out a two-hour nationwide political action in the form of a workplace strike on February 6th. There is.
Struggles and strikes have strong support. A poll conducted by Berean found that two out of three respondents supported a strike (support was even higher among young people, at 72 percent), and more than four out of five among workers supported the strike. I support it. (82%) expressed support. If the government does not back down, trade unions should call a political general strike to bring the country to a complete standstill with the aim of overthrowing the government.