The extension of Itella's collective labour agreements to the

1. 1 The extension of Itella's collective labour agreements to the entire sector for the delivers of unaddressed mail • impact on the social regulation in the sector Arja Ojapalo Author/Company

2. Background 2 • Itella Posti Oy offers postal services that include, for example, the delivery of letters, newspapers and unaddressed mail • In Finland generally binding character of a collective agreement depends especially on the organizing rate of employers and employees in the line of work concerned • Itella Posti Oy employs appr 18 500 workers Author/Company

3. Setting up collective labour agreement Collective labour agreement for communications and logistics is regarded generally binding the agreement covers delivery of unaddressed mail the decision was made by Ministry of social affairs and health on 11.9.2008 The parties of the agreement are Employers´ Association PALTA and The Finnish Post and Logistics Union PAU Collective labour agreement regulates minimum wage The decision approximately quadrubles the labour costs of the competing companies 3 Author/Company

4. What has happened since 2009 4 The decision was appealed to Labour Court by 24 companies Labour court decided on 24.6.2009 that the collective agreement is generally binding The Finnish Post and Logistics Union PAU has made various claims concerning unpaid wages - The claims are handled by court at the moment Author/Company

5. What has happened since 2009 5 Soon after the decision two new labour organizations were formed, one on the employee –side and one on the employer –side Organizations agreed on a competitive collective labour agreement concerning unadressed mail The organizations are claimed to be controlled by companies operating on the field of unadressed mail The companies using this cheaper collective agreement are highly profitable Most of the workers in these companies are very young and/or immigrants and don’t belong to unions Author/Company