Contract & Agency Labour Seminar 18 th January 2010 Introduction

1. Contract & Agency Labour Seminar 18th January 2010 Introduction

2. The importance of articulation • Extremely complex and diverse phenomenon from changes in work organisation • No consistent conceptualisations or terminology: ILO’s 50 year attempt to set standards for ‘contract labour’ • Difficulties in establishing the employment relationship • Increased inadequacy of existing legislation and regulatory mechanisms

3. Changing employment relationship • Externalisation: trend of obtaining labour from outside of the corporation’s boundaries. Linked to the strategy of outsourcing non-core functions • Triangulation/triangular relationship: third party involvement in the supply and management of labour

4. Precarious • on call/daily hire • homeworking • ‘self-employed’ • Temporary agency labour • probationary periods • student traineeships • Fixe • d term temporary contracts Precarious work • on call/daily hire • homeworking • ‘self-employed’ • temporary agency labour • probationary periods • student traineeships • fixed term temporary contracts

5. Drivers • Privatization & restructuring (Eastern Europe) • Deregulation & casualisation/flexibility (Western Europe) • Global production & supply chains (Asia) • Civil conflict & criminal activity (Colombia, Italy) • Migration • Private equity & financialization

6. The importance of research Pockets of data • Temporary Agency Work 2007 • Top 20 Private Employment Agencies 2008

7. Importance of an international perspective • International companies: MNCs are key principal companies, lobbying for deregulation, suppliers of labour, trade union leverage • International standards: new and existing international and regional standards • International responses: information, regional exchange, strategies, Global Union Federations

8. The importance of laws & Standards? • The need for laws and standards given the nature of precarious work to operate outside existing legal frameworks • Limits of dedicated legislation given the rapid, mutable and multiple forms of precarious work • Limits of legislation given the links to criminal activity, informal work, bonded labour, child labour, illegal immigration • Potential for worsening the situation for precarious workers • Often difficult relationship between unions and legal systems

9. International & regional regulation • ILO Recommendation 198 on the Employment Relationship • European Temporary Agency Workers Directive 2002 • European Posted Workers’ Directive 1996 • ILO Convention 181 Private Employment Agencies Convention, 1997 and accompanying Recommendation (No. 188) • OECD Guidelines and NCPs • Health & Safety legislation • International Framework Agreements (IFAs) and recognition agreements • ILO C98 the Right to Organise and Collective Bargaining Convention 1949 and ILO C87 Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organise Convention 1948

10. Violations reported C98: contract labour • Lack of employers’ and workers’ representatives to conduct collective negotiations • Increase of non-wage or self-employed working arrangements • Increase in cooperatives (Colombia) • Transformation of employment contracts into civil or commercial service contracts • Specific legal decisions where unions are denied the right to bargain collectively in subcontracting enterprises (Korean metal sector) Source: ILO, Celebration of the 60th anniversary of Convention No98, Geneva 2009

11. Trade union responses • Collective bargaining and company dialogue • Research and dissemination of information • Exchanges, particularly at company level and across regions • Campaigning: joint, national, international • Use of labour inspection systems • Setting up joint union/management initiatives • Lobbying governments on the social costs of increased precarious work • Organising

12. Organising contract & agency workers • Lack of awareness • Internal resistance • Weak links to the workers themselves • Hostile employment relations environments • Erosion of memberships • Erosion of collective bargaining • Age and gender

13. Four levels of collective bargaining • Principal companies • Contractors and labour agencies • Sectoral bargaining: strategic importance of public sector unions • National bargaining

14. Areas for negotiation • Limits set for the number of contract and agency labour workers • Increased rights around dismissals • Clarifications of the existence and nature of the employment relationship • Equal pay, benefits and conditions • Training • Information (strategic importance of information prior to contracts being signed)

15. Areas for negotiation continued • Limitation of circumstances e.g. replace permanent workers in the case of industrial action or dangerous jobs • Set maximum time periods • Transition to permanent status • Limit categories of work, sectors, or types of jobs where contract and agency workers can be employed • Extend existing collective agreements to apply to contract and agency workers

16. The importance of global unions • Awareness raising and corporate campaigning • Research and information • Dialogue with employers • Direct solidarity support • ILO Core Conventions and fundamental trade union rights complaints • IFAs and recognition agreements • Education and union building • Regional and international exchanges • Some diversity: Table 3