ETUC Midterm Conference
Lisbon, 8-10 November 2021
Opening speech of Luca Visentini, ETUC General Secretary
[To be checked against delivery]
Esteemed authorities,
Dear colleagues, comrades, and friends,
Let me first of all welcome you to our Conference on behalf of the ETUC Secretariat, and to thank our Portuguese affiliates CGTP-IN and UGT-P, particularly Carlos, Isabelle and their respective teams, for their invaluable support in the organisation of this event.
I would also like to thank the Portuguese government for the very positive cooperation we have built during their Presidency and beyond. I similarly thank the municipality of Lisboa for hosting us in this superb venue.
The Midterm Conference of the ETUC couldn’t happen in a more crucial time for working people and for the trade union movement.
After a year and a half of the pandemic, we now have the opportunity, and the responsibility, to shape a better future for working people.
We all have been doing our very best during the pandemic so as to protect workers and their health.
We have negotiated extraordinary support measures to save jobs, and to defend wages and working conditions.
We have been monitoring what was happening at national and sectoral level through our COVID Watch tool. We have supported our members in the implementation of the emergency measures, for them to reach agreements on health and safety at work, and for protecting working conditions and workers’ rights.
We have fought to improve trade union involvement in the design of the EU and national measures to deal with the pandemic, and the subsequent economic and social crisis.
Now it’s really time to transform Europe's recovery into long-term sustainable growth, supporting more and better jobs.
To do so, we need, first of all, to protect people’s health. A high rate of vaccination is fundamental for the economy to restart and for a safe return to work.
We reiterate our demand to the Commission and governments, to contribute positively to achieving a patent waiver. To strengthen the production of the vaccines. And enhance the technological capacity for such production.
Universal and free access to vaccines is a fundamental human right, and we are still lagging behind in too many European countries, not to mention the less developed continents.
In a global pandemic like the one we are experiencing, no country is better off being alone.
Moreover, we stress the need to continue improving investment in health and public services, not only to cope with emergencies like the one we experienced, but also in a structural way, as part of the recovery strategies of the European Union and each Member State.
We also demand that health and safety at work is prioritised in the policy agenda, and that ambitious legislative reforms are implemented in this field, both at European and national level.
Paving the path for sustainable growth means, first of all, creating quality jobs.
Workers and trade unions in Europe cannot accept that we return to the same jobless recovery that we had before the pandemic.
The COVID outbreak has forced 23 million workers into unemployment and 40 million have been suspended from work.
We welcomed the measures such as the SURE mechanism, aimed at protecting work, which were put in place at European and national level. They must be prolonged further until it’s necessary, and be made part of permanent support schemes for the future.
But now what matters the most is to make sure that every single euro of public money that is invested in the recovery is linked to the actual creation of quality jobs, and to the improvement of wages and working conditions. The investment should be clearly measurable, and therefore it requires clear conditionalities and monitoring mechanisms, not just soft recommendations, in all European and national investment plans.
To be clear, we cannot accept that public money once again goes only towards profits, and not to workers and society.
This time we cannot accept that the few jobs created are precarious, not protected, and underpaid.
And we cannot accept that there is no redistribution to working people and that inequalities are further increased, while taxes on corporations are pushed downwards and tax evasion and avoidance are still rampant.
For this not to happen again, the rules of our economic governance have to change, in order to facilitate investment and make sure that the environmental protection and social justice become an integral part of the Stability and Growth Pact, the Semester, and the Next Generation EU.
We appreciate the recent EPSCO discussion about the introduction of Social Imbalances Procedures, which would complement, in a biding manner, the existing Macroeconomic Imbalances Procedures.
Let us remember that at the Porto Summit we have agreed that Europe will go beyond GDP, towards an economic model that is at the service of people’s wellbeing.
It’s time to take responsibility and action – we demand that all institutions and employers be consistent with what has been committed in Porto.
In this context, as trade unions we will participate proactively in the public consultation that the Commission has launched on the review of the fiscal rules.
Such review is the most crucial and difficult political battle ahead of us next year. We have many opponents, and to win we need to make our voice well heard.
During the debate today and tomorrow, we will ask you to discuss a proposal to launch an ambitious trade union campaign on the review of the European economic governance, to stop austerity and build a more just, sustainable and inclusive economic model.
Sustainable growth means climate and technological just transitions.
We all agree that nobody must be left behind, but what does it mean in practice?
Trade unions support the objectives of the Green Deal, and we welcome the Just Transition Fund and the announced recommendation on the social and employment aspects of the climate transition.
However, we reiterate that offering training and social assistance as a compensation to workers who are going to lose their jobs, is not enough.
A real just transition implies anticipating change, and making massive investment in quality job creation in the same communities where jobs will disappear.
It requires the EU to build strategic energy and industrial policies, to channel investment in the right direction and to build a more sustainable and resilient European economy.
To achieve this, the EU must radically reform its competition policy, in order to stop internal dumping and allow Europe to compete in the global arena.
A real just transition requires environmental and social conditionalities to be embedded across the EU, national and local spending regulations.
It requires governance, a Just Transition Framework based on social dialogue, collective bargaining and workers’ participation.
The EU Social Partners are considering putting Just Transition at the core of their Social Dialogue work for the upcoming years, and we expect the same from the institutions.
A sound just transition is one of the fundamental elements in the reconstruction of the European Social Model, which has been disrupted by the austerity policies of the past.
A New Social Contract is what we need to build “a fairer Europe for workers”.
A New Social Contract that must be based on equal rights for all and on universal and adequate social protection.
This can be achieved only through the right balance between policy and legislation at European and national level. Let me be clear, the trade union movement must avoid the mistake often made by politicians, to formulate European and national policy that are conflicting and contradict each other.
In this respect, it's time to deliver on the important ongoing legislative initiatives on Minimum Wages and Collective Bargaining, Pay Transparency and Health and Safety.
But it's also time to speed up other directives, such as the ones on Platform Work and on Due Diligence, building on existing legislation at national level.
On Platforms, in particular, it's very important to recognise the presumption of employment with the reversal of the burden of prove, as it was ruled by most court cases so far.
It's also important to extend the scope of this legislation to all non-standard workers in the digital and traditional economy, and to exclude collective bargaining for self-employed from competition law.
We expect strong initiatives for the implementation of the European Pillar of Social Rights, based on the Action Plan adopted in Porto, but also initiatives to strengthen Social Dialogue, Tripartite Dialogue, as well as collective bargaining and workers participation at all levels.
This is essential to reinforce European democracy and build a fairer, and more inclusive, future for Europe.
Too often Social Partners’ involvement is too poor, particularly at national level, too often trade unions are under attack from illiberal governments.
What happened a few weeks ago in Italy, where the building of the major trade union CGIL has been attacked by fascists and anti-vaxxers, shows that democracy is at risk in Europe.
Trade unions have always been at the forefront in the defence of democracy, so there is no surprise that anti-democratic forces are attacking the trade union movement and trying to infiltrate the workplaces, and instrumentalise social discontent.
The ETUC has launched the important Roadmap ‘Building the Trade Union response to the rise of far-right’, this includes an ambitious set of initiatives. We will continue to take action and to build alliances to fight against fascism and the far right, and to strengthen democracy everywhere in Europe.
We expect all European and national institutions to do their part in this important battle, and we will continue being very active and vocal also in the framework of the Conference on the Future of Europe.
We want the Conference to produce concrete and ambitious results for working people, particularly in terms of social justice and reinforced democratic participation at all levels.
Comrades, friends,
The Midterm Conference of the ETUC is the occasion for us to take stock of the progress made in relation to the decisions and strategies adopted in the Congress.
But this time it’s something more.
Being held after the COVID pandemic, this Midterm Conference must be the opportunity for us to shape the future of the world of work in Europe, and to build trade union power and influence in addressing the enormous challenges we have in front of us.
I wish us all a very successful Conference and a fruitful discussion, from which we will be guided on the next steps in the ETUC action.
Obrigado! Thank you very much!
But this time it’s something more.
Being held after the COVID pandemic, this Midterm Conference must be the opportunity for us to shape the future of the world of work in Europe, and to build trade union power and influence in addressing the enormous challenges we have in front of us.
In this context, as trade unions we will participate proactively in the public consultation that the Commission has launched on the review of the fiscal rules.
Such review is the most crucial and difficult political battle ahead of us next year. We have many opponents, and to win we need to make our voice well heard.
During the debate today and tomorrow, we will ask you to discuss a proposal to launch an ambitious trade union campaign on the review of the European economic governance, to stop austerity and build a more just, sustainable and inclusive economic model.