The National Federation of Workers in Pharmaceutical Industries of Greece calls for massive participation in the National Strike on July 5 demanding Collective Contract with better wages and conditions.
In its press release the Federation states:
“A month ago, a new meeting of our Federation was held with a delegation of pharmaceutical companies of SFEE and PEF on the sectoral collective bargaining agreement. And from this meeting it became clear that the employers, the pharmaceutical industries, are seeking to shrink our labour rights and wages, now through the signing of the new collective agreement, which for a long time they refused to sign under various pretexts.
The draft counter-proposed in our Federation’s comprehensive contract proposal includes a minimal part of our demands and leaves out main demands concerning the terms and conditions of work in the sector, such as equal wage and institutional treatment of all workers regardless of their employment relationship and form of work (e.g. outsourcing workers) and the establishment of a fixed daily working time, i.e. the 5-day/week 8-hour/day.
What employers propose for working time is: “The duration of the working week of employees is set at 40 hours and for continuous operation companies the applicable legislation will be applied”! In other words, the regulation of working time in all its glory in application of the monstrous Hatzidakis law that abolishes the 8hour workday!
As for our wages, the employers’ proposal includes a 5% increase on the minimum statutory wage, which translates into 819 euros gross, i.e. 52 euros less than the minimum sectoral wage in 2009, while the cost of living for workers has risen sharply over the years!
Moreover, the pharmaceutical industries have told us, no sooner or later, to forget about benefits and triennials and to make do with what the miserable laws passed by their governments all this time!
We, the working people, experience daily the stress of bills, the cutbacks in social spending, the non-existent Health Care System, the stress of paying the rent of the house, the petrol. We are faced with a huge pogrom of anti-labour laws.
Our Federation continues with tenacity and perseverance the struggle that brings to the fore the modern needs and interests of the workers, without submitting to the arguments and various claims of the pharmaceutical industries and the employers of the sector as a whole, who are constantly reinforced by all the governments and the laws that are imposed, but they do not stop making more and more demands for their own interests.
We draw strength from the militant experience of the class workers’ movement, past and present. We are inspired by the conquests won by the working class through hard struggles and sacrifices. Life itself proves that when workers believe in their strength and enter the struggle collectively, decisively, militantly, they can face even the greatest obstacles, overcome even the strongest opponent, and gain militant experience – a legacy for the future and for the next, even more demanding battles.
That is why we will not stop demanding a sectoral collective agreement with substantial increases in our wages, the establishment of the 5-day – 8-hour working week, the extension of labour rights. The 5-day – 7-hour – 35-hour working week is more than topical on the basis of modern scientific and technological progress and the increase in labour productivity.
On the path of escalating the struggle for the sectoral collective agreement, we call on all unions and workers of the sector to join the battle for the organization and success of the sectoral strike on July 5.
The demand for structured labour rights, wage and institutional, with the collective guarantee and protection guaranteed by the sectoral Collective Contract, against the isolation and precariousness of the individual “negotiation” that the employers want to impose with the laws that serve their interests, is a matter for all workers, men and women, old and new.
Therefore, each and every one of us must make the success of the strike our own affair, with our mass participation. Let the factories, the pharmaceutical industries, the pharmaceutical warehouses, the pharmacies, the medical information go dead.
This must be our response to the “proposals” of the employers and their governments, aimed at intensifying our exploitation.
We will not allow them to blacken our lives so that their profits can flourish! Here and now our own needs for work and life with modern rights are in front!”
The Federation and the unions demand:
Signature of a sectoral collective agreement with increases in all wages – 950 euros minimum wage
Restoration of triennials with benefits from 5% to 9%
Benefits for university degree, foreign language skills, computer use – laptop and pharmacy assistant
Unhealthy work allowance 5%
One-off heating allowance of €1000 and €700 for each child up to the age of six
Equal pay and institutional treatment of all workers regardless of employment relationship and form of work
WE CALL FOR ALL UNIONS TO EXPRESS THEIR SOLIDARITY WITH THE
July 5 National Strike of Federation of Workers in Pharmaceutical Industries
SEND SOLIDARITY MESSAGES TO
Email [email protected]
@PAME_Greece
@syndikatopharm