Important victory for Finnish commercial workers as collective agreement sets minimum hours for shifts

Important victory for Finnish commerce union:
Collective agreement ends short shifts

Finnish UNI Commerce affiliate PAM has scored an important victory in the country's collective bargaining round. The union's initiative for the minimum length of working shifts to be set to 4 hours is now part of the national framework agreement, which sets the conditions for the collective agreements in all sectors.

In commerce and other services, the new rule will effectively hinder the exploitation of part-timers through ultra-short shifts. "This was in a way an intermediate goal for us", says the new union president Ann Selin in a Helsinki newspaper today. "Our main goal is still that people should as a rule have the right to work full time".

PAM is one of Europe's strongest commerce union and also organises in many other services sectors. Thanks to its high organising rate in retail and wholesale trade, its collective agreements are legally binding through the whole industry, also in enterprises that are not directly parts of these agreements.

Ann Selin was elected yesterday as president of PAM, succeeding Maj-Len Remahl. Anssi Vuorio was elected first vice president and Kaarlo Julkunen second vice president.