Social dialogue and cooperation are key to a brighter future

Prime Minister Stefan Löfven guested a seminar on the recent ILO report on the future of work, “Work for a brighter future”. Mr. Lövfen, who co-chaired the report, said that “if the global labour market doesn’t change its orientation, inequality, discrimination and salary gaps will continue to escalate”. The event was jointly organised by Union to Union and LO (the Swedish Trade Union Confederation).

By Johan Bengtsson, Union to Union

The report, which the ILO is currently promoting and working with, discusses the extremely complex challenges of our time. It is about climate change, growing gaps, aging population and hundreds of millions of people in poverty and unemployment. And we have no time to lose.

During the seminar, Philips Jennings, a member of the panel, who was a member of the global commission who penned the report and the former Secretary General of UNI global union, warned that “if we don’t change, we’re sleep walking into disaster”.

A human-centred agenda

The report has a clear message. In order to achieve a "brighter future", states, business, employers and trade unions must join forces on a common agenda that is human-centered and keeps equality and social security in its focus. Social dialogue and cooperation is the way forward, and the report states that the need for new jobs is huge. The labour market will need 344 million jobs until 2030.

During the seminar, Prime Minister Löfven emphasised that the pay gap between women and men must disappear. According to him, with equal wages, GDP in the EU would increase by 12 per cent.

“If the global labour market doesn’t change its orientation, inequality, discrimination and salary gaps will continue to escalate.

- Stefan Löfven, Prime Minister of Sweden

In addition to the right to lifelong learning for workers, investing in jobs for young people and stopping violence and sexual harassment at work, the global commission also proposes a universal guarantee for workers. Among other things, it would include fundamental rights such as living wages, regulated working hours, safe workplaces and the right to negotiate wages.

“This is the way forward!” exclaimed Karl-Petter Thorwaldsson, president of LO, the Swedish Trade Union Confederation.

Praising compromise

Kristin Skogen Lund, CEO of the international media group Schibsted, and former head of the Confederation of Norwegian Enterprise, was also a member of the global commission. She participated in the panel and praised compromise as a method. She explained that companies all over the world want to negotiate and be part of the future development.

“It cannot be that big companies get tax relief while local companies have to bear the cost of welfare of their shoulders.

- Kristin Skogen Lund, CEO Schibsted

Ms. Skogen Lund said that it is an economic and social paradox that fair employment and skills training of personnel are not counted as investments but as costs, and that pollution of the environment is seen as the consequences of necessary corporate profits.

“It cannot be that big companies get tax relief while local companies have to bear the cost of welfare of their shoulders," she said. Ms. Skogen Lund also stressed that with power and size comes a responsibility.

To conclude the seminar, Prime Minister Stefan Löfven mentioned that compromise for consensus characterises him and his professional life, and that it is a necessary approach: “everyone – politicians, companies, employers and trade unions - must help out to get the world we need and want”.