Brussels, 02/04/2015 (Agence Europe) - On Friday 27 March, employers' and workers' representatives called a temporary halt to the battle that has been waged in the International Labour Organisation (ILO) for the last two years over the place of the right to strike in international labour regulations. This clash has caused considerable concern, including in the European Commission.
Commissioner Marianne Thyssen (Employment, Social Affairs, Skills and Labour Mobility) spoke about this issue at the plenary session of the European Parliament at the start of February (see EUROPE 11250). She said at that time that she was “very concerned” at the continuing disagreement between employers' and trade union representatives over the place of the right to strike in the 1948 international convention (No 87) on freedom of association and protection of the right to organise, with the two groups disagreeing on whether or not the right to strike is protected by this convention. The importance of this issue is great as on it depends the ILO's right to challenge states that do not recognise the right to strike.
The disagreement still exists and agreement is unlikely to be found any time soon but the two groups have decided to call a truce, which ultimately is to the advantage of the unions. Things began to move at the informal tripartite meeting at the end of February, at which the representative of the states (government group) adopted a stance in favour of the unions, declaring that it had to be recognised that “the right to strike is linked to freedom of association, which is a fundamental principle” and that, “without protecting the right to strike, freedom of association, in particular the right to organise activities for the purpose of promoting and protecting workers' interests, cannot be fully realised”.
From that point, the employers understood that politically they had lost and resigned their offensive, ILO administrator Bernard Thibaud explained in an interview with French newspaper Libération on Saturday 28 March. The ILO executive board was, therefore, able, on Friday 27 March, to adopt a new report from the union freedom committee which points the finger of blame at several states, including Canada and Turkey, for nor recognising the right to strike. Nothing like that had happened for some two years.
Nevertheless, differences of interpretation persist, with employers “tending to take the view that what is acceptable in one country may not necessarily be so in another since, they argue, it is dependent on local attitudes”, Thibault said. The employers are backed here by the states, which feel that they ought to have broad freedom of movement on how this right is framed - which explains why all the players are speaking of a truce and not a lasting end to hostilities. (Jan Kordys)