News

On 19 March Dutch cleaners celebrated their 1^st anniversary of the agreement they signed last year after 9 weeks of strike.



700 cleaners, top leadership of the labour movement, three Members of Parliament, bosses and clients, and the Minister of Social Affairs participated in the event. The Minister thought he was only receiving the cleaners’ book about the strike, but he also received the “Butter-manifest” (a Dutch way of saying they are being hypocrites). FNV activists introduced him to the cleaners who clean the Ministry of Social Affairs. They exposed the deplorable behaviour of his Ministry towards cleaners and presented facts and figures supporting their claims, including proof of their tendency to grant contracts to the lowest bidder. The government is the largest client in the cleaning industry in the Netherlands (11%).



The settlement last year consisted of the following:



· 3.5% pay increase over two years - this is 1.5% more than the general wage settlement.



· It was agreed that temporary workers who went on strike would get their jobs back and a joint Commission was to be set up to make sure that this would not happen in the future.



· Dutch language lessons would be introduced for all new entrants to the industry. If they complete the 3-month course they will receive a Euro 750 bonus.



· A union advantage fund of 1.4 million Euros was set up to pay a bonus to every member of the cleaners section of the union.



· Another fund was set up to compensate the strikers for the loss of their holiday entitlements.



Video of the celebration

Pictures