Back to “business as usual”? – workers fear a jobless recovery

Brussels, 6 October 2009 (ITUC Online): “While some commentators see green shoots of recovery, the crisis is far from over and the global stimulus packages supporting economic turnaround will not be sufficient to keep joblessness from growing at a steady pace,” said ITUC General Secretary Guy Ryder, commenting on a new ITUC publication The Path to Recovery, How employment is central to ending the global crisis which reports that on average, only 1.8% of financial rescue efforts have been dedicated directly to employment measures.  This will be far from adequate to tackle rising unemployment, growing inequalities and declining living standards.

The new ITUC report, released to mark the World Day for Decent Work on 7 October 2009, highlights trade union actions to fight the crisis in Africa, the Americas, Asia and Europe and explains the steps needed to achieve a decent work-led recovery and build a fairer and more sustainable world economy for future generations.

The annual ITUC General Council opens today in Berlin and top of its agenda will be discussions around the global economic and jobs crisis and about how to maintain a focus on job creation and job quality.  ”Alternatives to the polarised, market-driven system that brought about the crisis are urgently needed”, said Ryder.  “Instead a real recovery will have to be based on decent job creation, adequate regulation and more public spending to bring forward a new sustainable and socially just world order.”

The recently concluded G20 Summit in Pittsburgh presented some significant advances on labour issues, with a greater role to the ILO, a forthcoming G20 Labour Ministers meeting in 2010 and a promise that global growth should not take place on the detriment of internationally recognised labour standards. However, the just-issued ITUC/TUAC evaluation of the Summit concludes that progress to re-regulate the financial market fell far short of the actions needed to prevent future speculative bubbles. Nor did the G20 leaders show sufficient ambition on climate change, despite meeting only  ten weeks before the crucial UN conference on climate change in Copenhagen.

http://www.ituc-csi.org/IMG/pdf/G20_evaluation-FINAL_10-2009.pdf

The ITUC has also been taking part in the crisis-dominated annual meetings of the IMF and the World Bank in Istanbul, where the ITUC has presented a trade union statement covering the continuing need to change their policy conditionality and to conduct counter-cyclical policies in developing countries as well as the demand to reform voting distribution on the IMF/Bank Boards more equally for developing countries.  http://www.ituc-csi.org/IMG/pdf/No_52_-_statement_imfwb_1009.pdf

“The current situation needs mending.  We detect some signs of economic growth, but businesses are afraid that progress is temporary and the unemployment rate keeps rising. Governments need to realise the necessity of talking to trade unions and investing more in active labour market policies, training and skills development before we end up in a perpetual jobs crisis bringing years of austerity for workers around the world,” concluded Ryder from the ITUC General Council meetings in Berlin.

To read the full report: The Path to Recovery, How employment is central to ending the global crisis:  http://www.ituc-csi.org/IMG/pdf/Finacial_crisis_EN-final.pdf

The ITUC represents 170 million workers in 157 countries and territories and has 312 national affiliates. http://www.ituc-csi.org y http://www.youtube.com/ITUCCSI

For more information, please contact the ITUC Press Department on:  +32 2 224 0204 or +32 476 621 018.