It is almost impossible for an employer to find qualified sales personnel in Copenhagen. As good as it is that there is a strong demand for shop workers, it brings also new problems. One of them is that on-the-job training easily becomes just ordinary working.

Jörgen Hoppe, President of UNI Commerce affiliated HK Handel, is concerned that trainees don't have enough time to learn their profession. In the greater Copenhagen region, it is next to impossible to find qualified shop workers, which leads to trainees being used just as part of the normal workforce. There is no time to observe and learn, the union says, and will now put the issue on its agenda.

- The trainee must of course feel that she or he is part of the everyday life at the workplace, says Jörgen Hoppe, president of Danish UNI Commerce affiliate HK Handel and of UNI-Europa Commerce.

- Therefore the trainees are in a way parts of the workforce. But turning it around: It is important not to forget that we are talking about training. The trainee must have the opportunity to pull back, to observe and to learn.

- If the employers end up using the trainees as a full-fledged workforce, they will get a lower quality training, says Jörgen Hoppe.

Tomorrow Tuesday, the union will visit stores in the greater Copenhagen area, to find out what the trainees are really doing. Jörgen Hoppe says that he himself wants to talk with a number of them, to hear how they experience their everyday working life.

- It is important that we do not suddenly get a negative reverse side to the favourable situation with low unemployment and strong demand for qualified personnel, says Jörgen Hoppe. He hopes that also the employers will take the issue seriously.

Promoting youth employment is the top issue on the present agenda of the commerce-sector European social dialogue. At a meeting in Brussels on 22 September, the European Union social partners EuroCommerce and UNI-Europa Commerce will try to identify concrete measures to tackle the unemployment of young people, which in most parts of Europe is an extremely serious problem.

.