Tusk looks to weaken the unions as postal strike looms
Postal workers could strike at any moment to demand wage increases, while the government is drastically seeking a way to diminish the role of trade unions. Five days ago trade unions of Polish Post (PP) submitted its demands to the general director seeking a wage increase of z³.800 gross on average with today named as the deadline for a reply.
Recently, Prime Minister Donald Tusk admitted that the act on trade unions has plenty of flaws, such as the “extreme multitude” of trade unions, which is diminishing the role of unions’ headquarters. A turning point was the strike of miners in the Budryk mine, but the number of strikes in 2007 was high regardless. In total there were 1,736 strikes last year, while in 2006 there were only 27 of them. A road to legal compromise might be difficult, as according to unofficial information the government wants among others to force trade unions to finance themselves with their own contributions or to ban them from having their offices in places of work. “This is an attack on democracy. Work of the trade unions is beneficial to everyone,” said Alfred Bujara, head of commercial sector trade unions. Others added that all governments wanted to change the law, but none of them succeeded, however the largest of them will also present some changes to the existing law.
