Higgins calls for equality in reconstruction
by Bernard Harbor
 
President Higgins called for strong rights to collective bargaining, secure work and adequate social protection.
President Higgins called for strong rights to collective bargaining, secure work and adequate social protection.

Post-pandemic economic reconstruction is an opportunity to create a more equal society where all work is valued, according to president Michael D Higgins.

 

Speaking at a global summit on ‘Covid-19 and the world of work’ earlier this week, he said the global health crisis had exposed the failures of the world’s economies, and called for a “new balance between economy, ecology, society and culture.”

 

The summit was organised by the International Labour Organisation, a United Nations body made up of representatives of governments, employers and unions.

 

“This Covid-19 crisis, that follows the earlier banking crisis, has laid bare the consequences of profound economic and social inequalities, which, taken together with widespread inadequacies in social protection, have scarred our global landscape for many decades.

 

“Tragically, instead of recognising the inequities of current systems, many governments and employers across the globe have used the crisis to further restrict the rights of working people through limiting collective bargaining, disrupting the right to strike, excluding workers from participation in the economy through their unions, and, in some cases, impeding even the registration of unions as part of civil society,” he said.

 

President Higgins called for strong rights to collective bargaining, secure work and adequate social protection.

 

“We continue to witness increases in precarious employment, contract working, and an ongoing casualisation of labour, with new and emerging trends in work practices that are often deemed ‘innovations’, innovations insofar as they provide new means to maximise profits for employers, but in their practical delivery reveal the ongoing erosion of employees’ hard-won labour rights,” he said.

 

President Higgins said digitalisation could have a positive impact on work, but that online workers needed the protection of basic employment law, collective agreements and social protection.

 

It’s never been more important – or more easy – to get the protections and benefits of union membership. Join Fórsa HERE or contact us HERE.

LikeLike (0) | Facebook Twitter