For 20 days, the workers of the Zadar cafeteria have been on strike for a basic workers’ right: the right to contract the salary base and the value of points for salary calculation through a collective agreement. The management of the Student Standard Agency the employer opposes the request because it wants to decide on salaries unilaterally. It has even challenged our right to strike and questioned its legal basis.
The right to regulate wages by collective agreement derives from Article 192, Paragraph 1 of the Labour Act (ZOR), which states that a collective agreement may contain legal rules governing employment or employment-related issues—which salary definitely is.
Article 193 of the ZOR prescribes the obligation to negotiate in good faith. In this strike, the employer has shown no such good faith, as they deny a basic worker’s right prescribed by labor law!
Trade unions are the only social partners on the workers’ side who are authorized to negotiate in good faith; therefore, they should be treated as equals to the employer, not humiliated.
Article 164, Paragraph 4 defines the position of the employee representative in the employer’s governing body (supervisory board, etc.). The representative should have the same legal position as other members of that body. The Agency’s management claims that this article provides workers with bargaining influence in determining wages and offers it as an alternative to collective bargaining with the Union. They argue that the Union only fights for its membership, while the workers’ representative in the employer’s body represents all workers.
However, the only legally recognized social partners are trade unions and trade union associations. An elected representative of a worker in an employer’s body can discuss what they want within that body, but that does not constitute a social partnership.
LEGAL BASIS OF THE STRIKE IN THE ZADAR STUDENT STANDARD AGENCY
For 20 days, the workers of the Zadar cafeteria have been on strike for…
Published by the Novi Sindikat / Wednesday, November 4, 2020
