At the time we met for our third session, we only had some introduction meeting reports and several questions from SWE3 through Ake Dahl to discuss. I suppose Youko will soon put the reports from this session and sessions 1 & 2 on the web site like he did with the introduction meeting. (Jouko, could you let us know when our summaries will be available on the web site ?)

Organising in TNC

We also feel like the workers should organise worlwide and not only locally or at the european level. Of course everything has its beginning but there is a need to federate organisations of workers to organise the spread of information. We also feel that it is essential that the grass-root knows what decisions are taken buy their representatives and how the different bodies are constituted to defend workers. Most workers are ready to organise but not for a pseudo mechanism of democracy.

Itís encouraging to read the case-study in Lithuania where trade-unions and associations foiled the water privatisation from Lyonnaise des Eaux.

In Belgium, we can see that rich people are getting richer and poor people more poor. The gap is getting bigger. With the fear that one day nobody will be in between. TNC are playing the game that make workers fight against each other to get a job even in bad conditions.

We can also see old jobs emerging. Jobs that had hardly dissepared like milkman or shoe maker, which reveals the crises where people have their shoes repaired rather than buy some new ones.The standard of living is getting down and we donít think it could be better in the years to come.

The European Works Councils

We had never heard about such institutions and the overview we read in English was not very clear to understand the role and impact of such bodies.

These councils bring together central management and workers representatives. But the disstinction is clearly made between workerís representatives and trade unions. Who are these workerís representatives ? How are they elected ? Why does the EWC not mention anywhere the words ì trade unions î as they are the first ones to represent workers ?

Where could we find more information on this subject, the constitutive documents of ECW ? Maybe directly in the European Commission or in the Internet ? Does someone have more references to work with ?

Answers to Ake Dahl and its SWE 3 group