February 28, 2023 at 12:10 pm
Major Trade Unions and Employers’ associations issue joint statement
The recent situation whereby a minority union is trying to undermine the demarcation between recognised majority unions representing employees collectively in relation to minority unions representing individual employees prompted the major trade unions and the major employer organisations to come together in a joint statement. The statement found here was issued by the General Workers’ Union, UHM Voice of the Workers, For.U.M, Confederation of the Maltese Trade Unions, Malta Employers’ Association, Malta Chamber of Commerce, Malta Chamber of SMEs and the Malta Hotel and Restaurants Association. It is clearly a strong position to safeguard boundaries and industrial relations stability and against the destabilisation of social dialogue. Minority unions have their rights but they cannot pretend to bypass the rights of the unions who are recognised at the workplace and who carry out collective negotiations on behalf of all employees. The statement quoted the specific article of the legislation:
Article 5 of Legal Notice 413 of 2016 Recognition of Trade Union Regulations, clearly establishes that: ‘Once a union is
recognized as the sole collective bargaining union, no other union may intervene on a collective matter relating to the employees concerned with the employer’. In addition, article 5 states that ‘no employer shall discuss collective matters relating to employees concerned with a union other than the recognised union’.
Please follow the link for the joint statement. The MUT is a member of For.U.M., one of the signatories of the joint statement.
