The European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) has pointed out that General Data Protection Regulation is producing collateral effects. In a press release published on its website on Thursday, 19 March, it states that this new tool is being used by employers to “challenge the rights of trade unions”.
After consulting its affiliates, ETUC actually notes that employers are using these new rules, applicable as of 1 May 2018, to prevent trade unions from contacting workers at their workplace.
“Access to the workplace is a basic trade union right, and in 2020, that means digital access too. Without it, trade unions can’t give workers the information they need to negotiate collectively with employers for fair wages and working conditions,” explains ETUC Deputy General Secretary Esther Lynch. ETUC highlights several examples, like in Spain where, the organisation claims, after the GDPR was published, numerous companies, and even public administrations, have been refusing to provide trade unions with the documentation necessary for their work on the pretext that data protection rules prohibit it.
“This trend is part of a broader attack on trade union rights in Europe, which limits the scope of collective bargaining,” laments ETUC, which calls on the European Commission to address this issue in its fair minimum wage initiative. (Original version in French by Sophie Petitjean)