UNI Europa at the ETUC Congress

The congress of the European Trade Union Confederation was held on 23-26 May 2023 in Berlin. Bringing together over 400 voting delegates from national trade union centres and European trade union federations to decide on the priorities and elect the ETUC’s leadership, it is the high point of democracy within the European trade union movement.

Strengthening collective bargaining through public procurement

With the target for each EU member state to reach 80% of its workforce covered by collective bargaining, it is time for action. Public procurement has a key role to play in strengthening collective bargaining.

A crucial opportunity presents itself to lead the way towards solutions in this regard. A key priority for UNI Europa is to mainstream its campaign to ensure ‘no public contract without collective agreement’ across the European trade union movement.

Using public procurement to expand collective bargaining was a prominent theme during the ETUC Congress. See the highlights in the article: Public procurement high on the social agenda for Europe.

Oliver Roethig intervened in plenary to outline the strategy. Watch his speech here.

UNI Europa delegation

As an affiliate of the ETUC, UNI Europa had a delegation of 20 representatives to carry the voice of service workers. You can see the seven interventions on behalf of UNI Europa (in chronological order) here:

• Peter Hellberg – “Decent pay and working conditions for all”
• Oliver Roethig – “We don’t just want a voice. We want a say.”
• Irena Liepina – “Our values of the European trade union movement”
• Louisa Bull – “Algorithms should advise and humans should decide”
• William Maunier – “the principle justifying collective agreements is power imbalance”
• Barbara Teiber – “It’s all about building workers collective power”
• Pilar Rato – “We are trade unionists, we are anti-fascists”