Opinion: Europe – still at the table, still making a difference

Pictured above: UNISON national business, community and environment officer Kelly Hannah-Rogers (right) signing a diversity and inclusion policy agreement with Veolia in March, in Paris, with Glen Flitton, the union’s national convenor for Veolia, and Paola Panzeri, the deputy general secretary of the European Public Services Union

By Donna Rowe-Merriman, UNISON’s national secretary for business, community and environment

When the UK left the European Union, many assumed UK influence on European labour practices would fade into the background. 

The reality is that, post-Brexit, UNISON continues to sit at the table with some of Europe’s largest employers through European Works Councils (EWCs). Global contractors like Sodexo, ISS and Compass still value the UK’s voice – and for good reason. With such a significant part of their operations based in the UK, they understand that the involvement of UK workers and their representatives is not just important, it’s essential.

Roughly 10% of UNISON’s membership is employed by these multinational companies, working in sectors that are the backbone of our society – schools, hospitals, universities, police services, and more. EWCs give us a powerful platform to push for better terms and conditions for these members – and we’re not letting that go to waste.

UNISON’s policy is to bring services back in-house – and this is a commitment of UNISON’s national private contractors forum. But we also know that change takes time and that’s why we work equally hard to ensure that, while we continue pushing for in-sourcing, we also push for members working for contractors to have parity of rights and protections. Sometimes that means negotiating contract by contract, but make no mistake, we are making gains.

One example of the importance of this engagement is the recent pan-European diversity and inclusion policy agreement with Veolia, covering 17 European countries. It took 18 months of hard negotiation, and during that time, we uncovered a key issue: in countries like France, Spain and Germany, constitutional restrictions mean employers can’t monitor ethnicity or race. That posed a serious challenge to pushing forward race equality as part of the agreement.

UNISON stood firm. We made it crystal clear that unless Veolia committed to a UK-specific, anti-racism bridging agreement, there would be no deal. And guess what? Veolia signed. That’s the power of international negotiation – and it’s a concrete example of how EWC work leads to national victories.

But we’re not stopping there.

The message is simple: Brexit hasn’t silenced our voice in Europe. We’re still here. Still pushing. Still winning.

If you are curious about how EWCs work, or if you work for an outsourced multinational contractor and want to get more involved – there are a ways you can take the next step.

• Join our EWC for beginners webinar on Tuesday 24 June from 12-1pm – it’s an informal introduction and everyone is welcome. Sign up here.

• Or, if you’re ready to roll up your sleeves and support the work of the national private contractors forum, drop us a line at private.contractors@unison.co.uk. We’d love to hear from you.