Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/943656
maltatoday SUNDAY 18 FEBRUARY 2018 Interview 14 By Raphael Vassallo The GWU started out 75 years ago at a wartime meeting in Msida to demand (among other things) the right to strike. From its inception, it was very much a blue-collar workers movement, and that association became even more pronounced in the 1970s and 1980s, when it briefly became statutorily fused with the Malta Labour Party under Mintoff. Times have changed considerably since then: labour issues have changed, and so has the definition of 'Socialism' in general. Some even argue that the 'age of unionism is over'. Do you agree? How do you see the GWU's role today? The GWU's core principles have remained the same. What has changed is the type of services we provide, and the customers we provided them to. If, in the past, Malta's economy was mostly based on manufacturing, or on the shipping industry, today it is leaning more towards financial services, and professional servic- es of a value-added, scientific, re- search and development nature. We need to tailor our services accordingly. An example I like to use is: if the GWU were a VHS video rental service instead of a trade union, today it wouldn't ex- ist anymore. Nobody rents videos nowadays: in the past, there were video rental shops on every street corner; today you won't find even one. If our services do not change, and we remain static, our role as a trade union would become just as extinct. We have to reinvent ourselves, however... I strongly believe that in today's capitalist, neo-liberal world, there is need for trade unions to balance things out... That is, in fact, the crux of the difference between today and the post-war period (all the way up to the late 1980s). Malta today embraces the prevailing capitalist, neo-liberal world view; it didn't under Mintoff, when our economic policies were based on nationalisation and protectionism. Doesn't this mean that the GWU is, in a sense, hankering after a worldview that is, in fact, extinct? I wouldn't say it's extinct. To- day, we are once again moving in the direction of protectionism. America under Donald Trump has introduced certain addi- tional taxes on products from South Korea, among other Asian countries. Now, even Europe is moving there: on the basis that, if America does it, we too will introduce measures to protect our industries... otherwise, it would be 'dumping'. It's in part an inevitable consequence of glo- balisation. There is no way glo- balisation can be stopped: that's for sure. So what should we, as trade unions do? We must give globalisation a more social face: one that is not based on cheap labour or lack of working condi- tions. Local companies are now in competition with companies in India and elsewhere, which use cheap labour and substandard working conditions. How are we going to compete? By lowering working conditions? That would be a race to the bottom. No, if there is competition, it should be on efficiency, while maintaining good conditions. The bottom line is that you can't be 'against' glo- balisation, because you can't beat it; but you can make the most of the available opportunities. And if employers are now globalised, trade unions must be globalised as well. We have to think nation- al... but act global. Perhaps, but isn't that also an admission that Socialism is dead? Today we have a 'Socialist' government that is, at a certain fundamental level, also very 'capitalist'.... It's a question we get faced with a lot. The government says it is 'pro-business', because when business is created, working con- ditions improve... Sorry to interrupt, but that is highly debatable. Government justifies its 'pro-business' stance by pointing towards economic growth statistics. And economic growth, in itself, is an EU target. It does not follow that working conditions would improve as a result: many would argue that the race to increase GDP – as an end in itself – has the opposite effect... it erodes workers' rights. Not necessarily. Let me give you a practical example. We were confronted with a situation when De La Rue informed us that some 330 redundancies were on the cards. It was closing down its Malta money-printing opera- tions, and moving them to other countries: including Sri Lanka and the UK. I told them: 'Nor- mally, the movement is to places where labour is cheaper. The UK is not cheaper than Malta. Can you tell me why you're relocat- ing there?' They didn't answer. We started working, as GWU, to find alternative employment for those 330 people. We contacted Crane, and asked them about the possibilities of moving to Malta – we have trained people, etc – and they liked the idea. Obviously, we then contacted government, and had nothing to do with the subsequent negotiations: except when it came to the part about working conditions. Now, when Crane opened here – i.e, when the economy expanded - those 330 workers were all absorbed. First we were faced with 330 re- dundancies – and I can assure you, as a trade unionist, that re- dundancies are the worst things you can be faced with – and thanks to the new investment, the problem was solved. But the crux of the matter is that, after all this, De La Rue decided to stay in Malta anyway. And they suddenly found they had a vacuum of 330 employees. Those workers had to be found somewhere... they start- ed approaching other printing presses, etc. Today, both Crane and De La Rue have agreed on a common benchmark for working conditions, to attract better peo- ple. Automatically, all the sur- rounding businesses – not just in printing – had to improve their own conditions, to retain their staff. That is also why, as a trade union, part of our aim is to work together with the employer, as a collaborative partner, to attract more investment... to create more job opportunities. That may be so from the GWU's perspective. Employers don't always see things the same way, however. The MEA, for instance, regularly accuses the GWU of jeopardising productivity (and hence indirectly threatening jobs) by proposing minimum wage increases, opposing its unpaid sick-leave proposal, etc... Traditionally, the criticism lev- elled at us has always been that we 'try to block investment', because we're 'too inflexible'. [Shrugs] I can give you a whole list of work- places, in the last three years, where we worked with the em- ployer to increase investment: De La Rue, Crane, Playmobil, the Hilton, the Dolmen, the avia- tion sector, Air Malta... During the economic crisis, for example, one of the hardest hit sectors was tourism; because if your foreign markets are all facing economic hardship, the first thing they cut back on are holidays abroad. So we were faced with a crisis. As a union, we accepted to freeze certain conditions in our col- lective agreements, to help the workplace cope... so that they wouldn't fire any employees. Now, naturally, when the coun- try is passing through an eco- nomically successful phase, it's a different story. Now, it's our turn to ask for pay rises. And expecta- tions are high... All the same, we are at a stage when there seems to be no convergence at all between unions and employers. The GWU continues to make demands, and the MEA continues to resist, arguing that the demands are unrealistic. It is also a fact that the vast majority of Maltese companies are SMEs or micro- If the GWU were a VHS video rental service instead of a trade union, today it wouldn't exist anymore. Nobody rents videos nowadays. If our services do not change, our role as a trade union would become just as extinct As a trade union, part of our aim is to work together with the employer, as a collaborative partner, to attract more investment... to create more job opportunities EXTINCTION COLLABORATION Is the age of union militancy