I pledge to support, promote and encourage the following principles within my work-place, my union, the trade union movement, and society more generally.
I am a trade union activist in favour of—
(1) A Trade Union Bill, in the Republic of Ireland and in Northern Ireland, to provide for union recognition, collective bargaining rights, representation on company boards, right to access for union organisers, strong anti-victimisation penalties, solidarity and secondary picketing, and repeal and replacement of the 1990 ROI act and the UK Trade Union Act 2016 where it impacts workers in Northern Ireland;
(2) Legislation to ban zero-hour contracts and to provide for secure hour contracts;
(3) A reduced working week, to make 35 hours the norm, and stronger legislation imposing overtime rates for all workers;
(4) A Jobs Bill to provide for full employment and putting the right to employment in the Constitution of Ireland and into legislation in Northern Ireland providing for a job neutral transition to environmentally sustainable workplaces;
(5) Stronger redundancy legislation, increasing the level of mitigation employers must go through and increased statutory minimum redundancy payments creating a common standard north and south;
(6) A reduction of the statutory pension age to 65, to bring it into line with most occupational schemes, and a mandatory minimum pension provision that employers with more than twenty employees must provide, with a compulsory minimum employers’ contribution;
(7) Equal pay for work of equal value; no lesser contracts for new entrants; enhanced gender equality pay legislation north and south and equality of pay and conditions for private sector care workers within the public sector;
(8) Legislation to make illegal any unpaid out-of-hours calls and work on mobile devices, tablets and computers in both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland;
(9) The strengthening of health and safety legislation in both jurisdictions to tackle the increase in work-related stress and to identify and remove the hazards that cause work-related stress, such as understaffing, imposed targets and unpaid overtime; and
(10) A renewed approach to the training of apprentices, with agreed rates, recognised qualifications, and union inspectors, with penalties for offences. All government awarded contracts should have a guarantee of apprenticeship places agreed with the appropriate trade union(s).
■ The charter can be signed at www.tuleftforum.com/workers-charter/.
