Collective bargaining and social dialogue in a time of transition

IndustriAll Europe is organising a two-year project from 2021-2023 to analyse the effects of the twin green and digital transition on the quality of employment in industrial sectors. The analysis focusses on how the changes caused by the twin transition are anticipated and managed by public authorities and employers. In this process, social dialogue and collective bargaining are key to ensure that good quality employment is maintained and created in the sectors most impacted.

The project assesses how social dialogue and collective bargaining structures can be strengthened to enable workers and their trade unions have a say in how the transition is managed. A fair recovery from the COVID-19 crisis to a green and digital industry with good quality jobs can only be ensured if workers participate in decisions about their future.

The main objectives of the project are to:

• Assess the impacts of the pandemic on work organisation and working conditions in the manufacturing sectors covered by industriAll Europe, including long-term implications.
• Analyse the effects of the twin transition on the quality of employment in the manufacturing sectors represented by industriAll Europe.
• Assess how the effects of the twin transition are anticipated and managed by public authorities and employers and the involvement of trade unions in the process.
• Collect trade union strategies, approaches and practices in tackling the COVID-19 crisis and ensure a socially responsible recovery to a green and digital industry.
• Build trade union capacities and define trade union strategies based on social dialogue and collective bargaining to respond to the challenges of the COVID-19 crisis and the twin transition.
• Strengthen and promote social dialogue and collective bargaining, as well as trade union and workers' rights across Europe.

The project consists of research on the transformation in our sectors and on trade union responses expressed in information/consultation processes, company agreements and sectoral agreements. The events will be three regional workshops and a final conference.