One thousand employees set to strike
to protect their company-specific agreement
with the City of Helsinki's bus company

JHL (07.05.2010 - Juhani Artto) Employees at the City of Helsinki bus company Helsingin Bussiliikenne Oy have decided to continue the struggle to keep their company-specific collective agreement. Around one thousand drivers and other employees are now prepared to commence a two-day strike that will begin in the early hours of Thursday May 20 and end on Saturday morning May 22.

The strike is being organised by the trade union JHL (The Trade Union for the Public and Welfare Sectors), to which the drivers belong, and Jyty (The Federation of Public and Private Sector Employees), the union of the company's salaried employees.

The employer announced -to everyone’s surprise- that at the end of April it is unilaterally replacing the company-specific agreement in favour of the bus traffic national collective agreement. Drivers and other employees condemn this unilateral move, which they see as an attempt to undermine working conditions and a deliberate effort to cut costs at the expense of the workforce.

The drivers say that probably most of the drivers and maintenance workers would see their annual incomes shrink should the employers succeed in implementing its unilateral decision. As things now stand, a not insignificant part of workers’ annual income comes from various allowances that the employer is now trying to cut.

And in another effort to extend its power the employer has tried to extend its leash by forcing employees to do in various shifts and to dramatically shorten the planning period of the shift setting. All this does is serve to disrupt employees' chances to combine a decent family life with a working career.  .

On Thursday, the free daily newspaper Metro reported on efforts to scare drivers during their late April protest strike. Foreign immigrant drivers in particular, were targeted by phone calls where unknown persons told them that by participating in the strike they were risking their own future employment chances. Juha Hakavuori, the managing director of Helsingin Bussiliikenne Oy, when interviewed by Metro, the local free newspaper publication, was quick to condemn such harassment.