How the Government’s guillotine will hit your daily life: it will be easier to fire people, the right to strike is under threat, unemployment security and housing allowance have already been cut

Since last autumn, trade unions have been resisting the Government’s cost-cutting policy by organising strikes. Here is a recap on how the Government’s cuts will weaken Finnish people’s social security and working life terms and conditions.

More families will fall into poverty, less assistance for housing and unemployment, serious grounds for firing someone will no longer be needed, strict limits will be set for sympathy strikes. The lists of Government cuts and their impacts are horrifying to read.

We’ve put together a comprehensive list of the Government’s cuts, some of which have already been implemented. Download the list of cuts in A4 (PDF file)

Social security cuts are pushing children into poverty

The Government has already started its cuts from, say, unemployment security. Housing allowance has also been cut. That allowance is necessary for many employees, especially in low-pay sectors. According to Kela’s statistics, over 64,000 employees received general housing allowance in 2021 (Kela = the Social Insurance Institution of Finland).

For instance, those working in the social welfare and health care sector will find it even more difficult to lift themselves out of the pay gap, as career advancement usually requires further training. In the future, people will have to pay for their own further training because the Government wants to abolish the adult education benefit.

At the end of 2023, SOSTE (the Finnish Federation for Social Affairs and Health) published a calculation showing that the Government’s policy will increase poverty across Finland. The number of poor children will increase by up to 13.6 per cent.

Will it increase the employment rate if firing people is made easier?

Some of the cuts that the Government is pushing for will cause great inconvenience to employees without any real benefit to the employment rate and the economy. The Government has been unable to present calculations on how the employment rate would be affected by, say, limiting sympathy strikes, increasing local agreement, the pay model tied to export sectors’ raises, or by easier firing.

Many legislative proposals have been prepared with haste. The Government has been reprimanded by the Chancellor of Justice, who oversees the legality of the Finnish Government’s operations.

The Government is cold, hard and cruel towards employees

The Government is very much on the side of the employers. For the employees, it’s a bumpy ride. They’re being offered weakenings of the rules of working life.

This can be explained by comparing the Government Programme to the employers’ election goals. For instance, making it easier to fire people, ruthlessly increasing local agreement and dismantling general applicability are a direct copy of the goals of business life.

Here is a list of some of the ways in which the Government plans to weaken the terms and conditions of employment:

• An employment contract can be concluded for a fixed term of one year without a justified reason.
• Sickness fine – one-day waiting period if a sick leave lasts less than five days.
• Firing law – no serious grounds will in the future be needed for firing a person.
• The obligation to undertake change negotiations will be abolished in workplaces with fewer than 50 employees.

Did you defend your terms and conditions of employment by striking? The Government wants to fine you EUR 200

Since last autumn, trade unions have been organising political strikes to resist the Government’s policy that brings misery. Strike action has been necessary because the Government refuses to come to the negotiation table. Instead, politicians are going to limit Finnish people’s right to strike which is based on international agreements.

The Government is going to limit political strikes and sympathy strikes and, at worst, give heavy fines to people participating in strikes.

Export model may further increase pay differences

One of the reforms that the Government is intensely pushing for is the so-called export model. In practice, this means that no sector would give larger pay raises than the export industry. Not even the National Conciliator would be able to agree on larger raises.

This model is poison for low-pay sectors. This has to do with the fact that the percentage hikes of salaries will result in more money going to those who already have higher salaries. When this happens over and over again, the differences in pay will certainly not diminish. They will increase.

The figure below shows the pay difference between science and technology specialists and nursing and health workers. The pay information is from 2022, and it has been taken from the statistics of Statistics Finland: Local government sector wages and salaries and Private sector monthly salaries.

In the example calculation, both groups of professionals are paid a two per cent (2%) pay raise six times in a row. At the beginning, the pay of specialists is slightly over EUR 4,000, whereas the pay of nursing and health professionals is under EUR 2,800. The difference between these groups of professionals is approximately EUR 1,250. That difference is constantly getting bigger because those with higher pay get more euros as their pay is raised during each negotiation round. After the raises, the pay difference is already over EUR 1,400.

The Finnish labour market is heavily segregated by sex. This can be witnessed in, say, social welfare and health care services. In 2022, women’s proportion of the sector’s employees was 85 per cent. The gender pay difference is slowly declining in Finland. Women’s earnings were 16 per cent smaller than men’s in 2022.

Strikes 2024 – Serious grounds

The Government of Finland is making cuts that hit employees and people with a small income. The Government is going to bring misery to working life and harshly weaken social security. The list of planned cuts also includes limiting the right to strike.

The strikes in spring 2024 are political strikes that oppose the Government Programme’s weakenings to working life.

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