Nilsson, who works with machine servicing in the Kvarnsveden Stora Enso plant in Borlänge—employing some 900 workers—was referring to recent announcements by the Metalworkers Union, Wood Workers Union, Construction Workers Union, and Electrician Workers Union that they are joining the Paper Workers’ Union in solidarity actions with some 25,000 workers in Finland locked out by the paper companies Stora Enso Oyj and UPM-Kymmene Corp.

“It would be terrible if the bosses pushed their demands through there, we are worried that they will try the same thing here,” he said.

In mid-May the paper industry bosses imposed a four-week lockout on some 50 paper, pulp, and paper board mills, and on May 31 extended the shutdown to the end of June. They are demanding a range of concessions that include the introduction of two unpaid “quarantine days” for workers when they take sick leave, 12-hour shifts, production through the Christmas and mid-summer holidays, the hiring of service personnel like cleaners not tied to the contract, and the cancellation of a 10-year-old agreement that put some restrictions on when the bosses can layoff workers.

After contract negotiations stalled, the Finnish Paper Workers’ Union decided March 30 on an overtime ban. “We have a shortage of workers. It’s enough if one or two are sick. That’s why it’s impossible for us to make a commitment to not stop the machines,” said Kari Mietten, president of the local at the Tainionkoski plant in Finland, April 29 to Huvfudstadsbladet, a Swedish daily newspaper published in Finland.

On April 28, 23,000 paperworkers went out on strike, shutting down the country’s entire paper industry. The union then called a common strike for May 15-18, again stopping production. The bosses responded with a lockout that started immediately after the strike ended.

As the strike came to a close, Finnish prime minister Matti Vanhanen said the government was prepared to intervene in the conflict. While claiming the government would not take sides, he assigned the head of the National Arbitration Board “to map out in which situations the paperworkers strike could affect peoples’ health”—indicating that the government is looking for a pretext to act in the interests of the bosses.

In Sweden, the Employers Association is calling for an outlawing of solidarity strikes. “The Finnish paper conflict and the Swedish union’s actions, including sympathy actions, illustrate well how unreasonable it is that sympathy actions are allowed,” Ulla Hamilton of the Swedish Employers Association, said in a May 19 statement. “That’s how much respect the Swedish unions have for one of the basic cornerstones in Swedish collective contracts—the no-strike pledge.”

This refers to the law prohibiting any struggle against the bosses for the duration of a union contract. Solidarity strikes are exempted from that law. Forest and electrical industry spokespeople have joined in with similar attacks on workers’ right to engage in solidarity strikes.

Well before the lockout, the representatives in the European Work Council for Stora Enso from Sweden, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Czech Republic, Austria, Estonia, Lithuania, Spain, Portugal and Finland met April 28 in Helsinki, Finland, and launched a call for solidarity with the Finnish workers. “The employer should consider that the actions in Finland could have an impact on the factories all over Europe. The Paper Workers’ Union in Finland is not standing alone, but side by side with the whole international labor movement,” said a statement the group released.

“I would be surprised if no paper machine stops because of this,” said Lennart Olovsson, contract secretary of the Swedish paper workers union in a May 15 interview in Svenska Dagbladet. He was referring to the solidarity overtime ban in Sweden. “In Finland there’s been an overtime ban for one month with more that 200 stops [in production],” Olovsson added.  
 
 
Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home