Effect given to the recommendations of the committee and the Governing Body - Report No 307, June 1997

Case No 1725 (Denmark) - Complaint date: 12-JUL-93 - Closed

Effect given to the recommendations of the Committee and the Governing Body

1. 26. When it last examined this case at its March 1994 meeting (see 292nd Report, paras. 197 to 229), the Committee had considered that certain aspects of Danish legislation and national practice were not completely in conformity with the principle of free bargaining of collective agreements with a view to regulating the terms and conditions of employment by means of collective agreements, as recognized in Article 4 of Convention No. 98. The Committee had reached this conclusion particularly in respect of section 12 of the Conciliation in Industrial Disputes Act which allowed the public conciliator to link various draft settlements of all occupational fields in a single draft settlement covering, inter alia, collective agreements for which the parties themselves could not agree to a renewal. The Committee had therefore invited the Government and the social partners to re-examine the legislation and practice in this regard.
2. 27. In a communication dated 11 March 1996, the complainant (the Danish Union of Journalists) submitted a representation under article 24 of the ILO Constitution. The Governing Body, which declared the representation receivable, referred it to the Committee for examination in the context of the follow-up of Case No. 1725 since it raised the same issues as those raised in this case.
3. 28. In a communication dated 14 April 1997, the Government indicates that it has amended the Conciliation in Industrial Disputes Act on the basis of the Committee's recommendations. In this respect, the Government refers to section 12(3) of the Act which now stipulates as follows: "A conciliation proposal may only be combined with other conciliation proposals if the negotiation possibilities within the field concerned are considered to have been exhausted. The Public conciliator decides whether this condition has been fulfilled." The Government adds that the Act has been further amended to relax the requirements as to the qualified majority needed to reject a conciliation proposal. The Government maintains, however, that the rule concerning the combination of proposals is a necessary element in the Danish industrial relations system, due, inter alia, to the fact that workers are organized into various trade unions at the enterprise level according to the nature of their work.
4. 29. The Committee notes that section 12 of the Conciliation in Industrial Disputes Act as amended provides that, in the future, conciliation proposals from various occupational fields may be combined only if the Public conciliator is of the view that negotiation possibilities have been exhausted. The Committee notes, however, that under this system it will still be possible for an overall draft settlement to cover, inter alia, collective agreements involving an entire sector of activity even if the organization representing most of the workers in this sector rejects the overall draft settlement. The Committee would therefore recall, as it has done previously, that the extension of an agreement to an entire sector of activity - in this case, journalism - contrary to the views of the organization representing most of the workers in a category covered by the extended agreement is liable to limit the right of free collective bargaining of that majority organization.