Companies are making it harder for trade unions to organise or represent their workers, a new report suggests, and are using tactics such as refusing officials physical access to workplaces, monitoring employee communications and victimising activists to weaken union activity.
“Union Access to Workers in Ireland – Barriers faced by representatives in Ireland within a comparative European context,” was written by the University of Limerick’s Dr Michelle O’Sullivan and Dr Caroline Murphy for the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, a German government funded foundation “committed to the values of social democracy”.
The research, which is to be launched on Wednesday at an event in Dublin, includes a survey of trade union officials regarding their experience of attempting to organise and represent members in Irish workplaces.
The results suggest 92 per cent have witnessed or experienced incidents of victimisation of members or activists with 30 per cent saying it is a tactic regularly employed to deter organisation.
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Just over 80 per cent had experience of being prevented from physically entering workplaces and 77 per cent said they were aware of instances of employee communications having been monitored.
About 60 per cent said achieving union recognition had become harder during their time working in the area while just 5 per cent said it had become easier.
The tactics employed by firms to avoid unionisation varied widely, a majority of the almost 200 respondents suggested, however, with 82 per cent saying they were also aware of instances where pay and conditions had been improved in a manner that bypassed unions and 78 per cent citing the establishment of alternative forums such as staff representative councils.
The research comes as unions continue to press for significant measures from Government to boost levels of collective bargaining coverage as part of the transposition of the EU directive on adequate minimum wages.
Average coverage across Europe is put at 56 per cent while in Ireland it is 34 per cent but that falls below 20 per cent when the public sector is excluded.
The directive requires governments to promote collective bargaining in countries where coverage falls below 80 per cent. the unions want legislation to introduce measures to achieve that level. Ibec has argued no legislation is required.
The issue is of critical importance to the unions which see directive as an opportunity to reverse a steady decline in private sector membership with the existing legislative landscape effectively leaving industrial action as the only way of securing recognition in workplaces where employers do not want to engage.
“The best way to make work pay is by promoting and supporting collective bargaining, said Irish Congress of Trade Unions, general secretary, Owen Reidy. “The EU directive commits the Government to do just this. It is unacceptable that hundreds of thousands of workers across the State are still denied access to unions and collective bargaining.”
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