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Trade Union News from Finland
Tekijä (05.11.2025 - Heikki Jokinen) Many people believe that Finnish public mid-week holidays with pay are based on legislation. Wrong. The only paid day off by law is Independence Day in December. All other public mid-week holidays (arkipyhä) with pay exist thanks to the collective agreements made by the trade unions.
During the course of a year, there are a maximum of eleven such public holidays that may take place on weekdays, not on the weekend. The number of such days varies from year to year.
Depending on the collective agreement, the mid-week public holiday is usually a free day. This is invariably the case for those with a monthly salary. They get their normal salary and a day off.
Tekijä (13.08.2025 - Heikki Jokinen) Shop stewards are a crucial part of the union. They are the people the union members trust with their everyday problems. They are the people who are there to ensure that workers' rights, collective agreements, and laws are respected in the workplaces.
In every workplace, covered by an Industrial Union collective agreement, employees can elect a union member as their shop steward (luottamusmies). The elections are held every two years. Any union member can be a candidate in his or her workplace, and all members have the right to vote.
The tasks of a shop steward are to negotiate, make agreements, settle disputes, and channel information between the employees and the employer. To this end, the collective agreements guarantee training, remuneration, and paid time off for these tasks. In companies with more than 400 employees, a shop steward is a full-time job.
Tekijä (11.06.2025 - Heikki Jokinen) The Act on Co-operation within Undertakings is a law that seeks to encourage continuous dialogue in order to develop a long-term relationship between the employer and employees at work. It serves to enhance the culture in which both employees and employers co-operate by respecting each other's rights and responsibilities.
In 2022, the law was amended. This law strengthened the right of employees to make proposals and present alternative solutions in the change negotiations regarding layoffs and redundancies.
Now, the right-wing Orpo-Purra Government has rewritten the law, only three years after it was enacted. New rules will be valid from the beginning of July. Unsurprisingly, the new law has been reconstituted only for the benefit of the employers. For workers, it might mean a loss of thousands of euros.
Tekijä (23.04.2025 - Heikki Jokinen) In Spring 2024, the Government of PM Orpo’s legislation limited the legal right to strike. The new rules lack clarity and are likely to create insecurity and create false impressions.
Anna Tapio, head of the Industrial Union legal department, and union lawyer Susanna Holmberg view the changes as substantial. The Government limited political strikes to a maximum of 24 hours, imposed severe restrictions on sympathy strikes, and raised union strike fines.
- The employees' possibility to influence has been limited really harshly, Tapio says in her interview in Finnish for this magazine.
In Finland, the number and frequency of political strikes has been marginal. For this reason, there is no clear case law, a practice developed through court decisions. However, political strikes did have some limits before, too.
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