News

Millions of finance employees could provide the best early warning system to alert international regulators about breaches of regulatory standards by finance companies, according to proposals to be announced this week by the global trade union, UNI Global Union.



Ahead of the G20 financial summit in Washington on 15 November, UNI Global Union is urging key international regulators to adopt a structured process for bottom-up monitoring by employees, in order to strengthen any new financial regulatory framework that they agree.



The proposal will be formally presented to senior finance union representatives at the UNI-Europa Finance Conference on 6 November, in Vienna. But UNI today wrote with the proposals to the head of the International Monetary Fund, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the President of the Council of the European Union, Nicolas Sarkozy, the President of the European Commission, José Manuel Barroso, the Chairman of the Eurogroup and Prime Minister of Luxembourg, Jean-Claude Juncker, and the President of the European Central Bank, Jean-Claude Trichet. Union affiliates are also writing to their national governments and regulators.



Under the proposals, UNI’s three million finance members, working in companies in 98 countries, would monitor the operation of regulatory standards on a continuous basis, and report breaches to UNI’s global headquarters, via its 215 union affiliates. UNI would then present a quarterly report to regulators, highlighting serious regulatory breaches, risks and trends.



UNI Global Union General Secretary Philip Jennings, said: “Our three million members who work in finance companies throughout the world must be the eyes and ears of a new financial regulatory system. Top-down national finance regulation has clearly failed. We propose a strengthened international regulatory framework with a bottom-up approach, to provide early warning when companies are committing serious breaches of both the letter and the spirit of new regulations.



“As a Global Union, we have a unique reach, depth and expertise in finance, which can help ensure proper regulatory supervision and prevent a repeat of the irresponsible practices which have brought our finance system to the brink of collapse.



“Our proposal marks a new approach for trades unions. Criticising those who brought about this crisis is not enough: we have a responsibility to our members – and to all employees whose jobs are at risk from a financial collapse – to become partners in a new regulatory monitoring process, to make sure that this never happens again.”





For more information, contact:

Oliver Röthig (Geneva): +41 796 796 505 (mobile) or +41 22 365 21 53 (office)

Stephen Hardwick (London): +44 (0)7515 390 549



The press release is also available in Español, Français, Deutsch, Portugues.



The proposal is attached below:





The press release is also available in PDF: