Speech by Philip J. Jennings
FIET General Secretary
12 October 1999
Chairman, participants,
It is a great pleasure for me to address this forum today. I represent the trade union movement and those workers that are in the eye of the e-commerce storm. FIET is active in the work of the Trade Union Advisory Committee to the OECD. Indeed we welcome their initiative in organising a seminar yesterday themed "The Public Voice In Electronic Commerce". It is important that the voice of the civil society is listened to.
My message to you today is that it is time to bring a social dimension to the discussions on e-commerce. To take it from the gee whizz wonders of the technology and more to how it impacts on working people and their families. In short can electronic commerce which amplifies the process of globalisation, put people first?
Our priorities are a seat at the table, the reinforcement of democratic processes, social cohesion, a fair distribution of wealth and full employment. Workers as stakeholders will not demand anything less. We want the emerging information society to be adapted to the needs of people and the concerns of people.
This revolution cannot be left to business interests alone nor should it pander to outdated thinking that there is no place for a public policy debate and initiatives in terms of regulation.
E-commerce will have a fundamental impact on employment, job security, work organisation and industrial relations and the coverage of collective agreements.
Indeed as Telecom 99 in Geneva confirms Internet and mobile telephony combined will bring massive business and social change.
This is why the most ambitious and significant change in international trade union structures is occurring and will be launched in January 2000. We will create a new International for the new millennium.
Whilst I speak to you as General Secretary of FIET in January I will speak as General Secretary of UNION NETWORK INTERNATIONAL - UNI.
Four Internationals:
FIET for services and Information Technology.
CI for post and telecoms
IGF for graphical and print media, and
MEI for media and entertainment will join together.
FIET, CI and MEI have voted unanimously to create UNI. The IGF votes this week.
This is a strategic decision, which will embrace all those employed in electronic commerce. Convergence is having its impact on union structures. It is a new solidarity structure that embraces some 140 nations and 800 unions and 15 million members, all of which will be networked on line. Our aim is that each local member becomes a global player.
Moving from our traditional membership base we will embrace call centres, hi-tech companies, teleworkers, on-line workers, broadcasting, multi-media and creative workers. Our aim is to ensure that they have decent working conditions. We will be the International in cyber space. We will also use e-commerce techniques to promote our work and recruit new members. The virtual union is being born.
In UNI we see change at all levels of the labour market which have social implications:
The scope and future funding of social welfare and social insurance also comes into focus.
This issue demands an active labour market policy to bring the adaptability required - to ensure social cohesion and social inclusion.
We should already be preparing ourselves for tomorrow's employment shocks.
With the aim to prevent the unfair polarisation in the workforce.
To handle the erosion of job security on the one hand and the growth in precarious employment on the other; and how we encourage new reflections on working time and work and family responsibilities.
It requires an amplification of employment and social policy beyond national boundaries where e-commerce makes irrelevant borders, time zones and distance.
I would like to highlight a number of issues:
We should pursue a social dimension through a social dialogue.
Where is the dialogue about the social dimension to change prompted by e-commerce? It requires engagement from government and business.
Where is the engagement from MCI WorldCom and Sprint that would rather close locations than entertain relations with local unions. Where is the dialogue with Walmart the world's largest retailer, which in the USA steadfastly refuses to recognise unions, which accepts the dollars of union members but will not deal with their organisations.
Working people require the opportunity to participate in forums, in decisions that will shape their working lives and that of their children for generations. We want a seat at the table. At the OECD there is TUAC and BIAC. We should be working together to develop the social agenda.
But for example - where is the seat at the WTO?
The solution is for the international organisations and national governments to put structures of dialogue in place with the brief to bring a social dimension to change.
It requires:
There has to be a place for participation and involvement of working people on decisions such as:
This includes the future structure of the business. The Financial Times leader yesterday stated that 50% of existing telecom operators in Europe could be merged or acquired in the next few years. There has to a dialogue with unions on this. Indeed our Irish affiliate, the CWU, have gone one step further to ensure involvement by buying 14% of the stock of Telecom Eirann
E-commerce will bring with it new reflections on education provision.
The success of e-commerce, in the end will be dependent on people.
It is not just their purchasing power but their time, their knowledge, their skills, their motivation and the opportunities open to them.
There is high employment in key areas and labour market shortages everywhere in the IT field.
It requires a new look at education both at school, in vocational and further education.
It requires new infrastructure investment.
It requires a new commitment by business to lifelong learning. It not you will be the victim of job hopping and people voting with their feet.
Training, retraining, constant recycling is a union management issue.
But who pays for it?
The stakeholders are concerned about the adequacy of public infrastructures and their financing. We are concerned about the potential for tax avoidance in cyberspace. There are more expert on this subject than I am on this - sorry I do not mean the room is full of people who practice tax avoidance - but social insurance funding is national, government tax revenues are national, education provision is national.
Surely it requires new thinking.
But when these issues are raised it too often brings a hysterical response from the business community.
Will e-.commerce taxation really be such a barrier to innovation? Our public responsibilities mean that the tax base must be maintained. Internet shopping should not be a tax-free island, why should bricks and mortars stores be penalised? This requires further consideration by the OECD.
We also require good governance of e-commerce. A social dimension requires a regulatory framework. A framework that also looks at the concentration of business. We have to smile when we see the clamour to generate a new risk taking entrepreneurial spirit when MCI World Com/Sprint have 2/3 of the Internet backbone and with ATT have 80% of the long distance telephone market.
But again discussion of regulatory frameworks brings with it exaggerated and stereotyped responses.
Leave it to the industry cries one corner - self-regulation rules cries another.
We need good governance, which embraces:
None of these should or could be matters of pure self regulation alone.
Above all good governance should be about universal access.
There must be universal access for all, where access is available regardless of where you may live or the income you earn.
Our planetary ambition should be to treat access to the Internet as an issue as important as the provision of clean water, education and basic health care.
Which brings me to a consideration of labour standards.
The international policy attention has focussed on liberalisation of markets for IT based products and services.
Little attention has been paid to establishing and enforcing a set of common social standards. This must be overcome.
New global digital networks bring about new opportunities to delocalise manufacturing, servicing and distribution activities, some may be prompted to avoid tax and social costs.
We have the fear that this brings a downward adjustment in social welfare, working conditions and standards of living.
We want to avoid a "race to the bottom" so why not bring a social dimension through adherence to basic labour standards and the core conventions of the ILO.
We should not tolerate that the e-commerce provision of goods is based on a violation of these standards,
Indeed we would like to see new rights - on line rights for on line workers.
We want on line workers who are often working for the same company in different countries, to have the right to use the internet and intranets of companies for purpose of communications and solidarity. Chairman, visiting a union's web site, sending e-mails to works councillors and union officials is not the same as visiting a pornographic site - although to listen to some CEO’s you would think so.
We need global initiatives to obtain on-line rights for on line workers. This could also include provisions to protect workers in what are often very intrusive workplaces - the degree of monitoring and surveillance is unprecedented.
We should also protect intellectual property.
We view creator's rights in the content industries to be as fundamental as workers rights. The violation of intellectual property is the violation of those rights.
There must be a commitment from governments to invest funds in research; anti-privacy measures and rights management systems. The OECD must support and collaborate with the initiatives of other international institutions, including WIPO to develop international norms and regulatory measures to ensure that creator's rights are protected and remunerated.
In conclusion
Our organisations are responding to the e-commerce challenge by creating a new organisation, with new structures, services and capacities.
We aim to develop new collective bargaining and work arrangements to develop a new model of social partnership.
To develop a better quality of working life for our members.
Better job content, full employment, lifelong learning. We want a sonally responsible approach to organsational change.
A new world is being constructed. If we are to have a convergence of stakeholder interests then it requires a social dimension. This message should not be last in cyber babble.
There is a place for social partnership.
Yesterday the UK's largest and most successful retailer TESCO announced an expansion of its internet shopping business into 100 stores. It claims to be Britain's most successful on line shopping outlet.
At TESCO there is a partnership agreement with the local union where over two thirds of the staff belong to the union.
E-commerce innovation based on dialogue and partnership that is a recipe for convergent stakeholder interests.
OECD there is a social agenda - its time to pursue it.
UNI and the Trade Union Advisory Committee (TUAC) are committed to working with you to achieve it.