Derecognition move challenged
A worldwide campaign to persuade the United Nations to reverse its decision to derecognise its unions has been launched by the LabourStart online union news organisation.
In July, UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon made the astonishing decision to derecognise the unions that represent its 65,000 staff around the world.
The international committee for UN unions, the Coordinating Committee of International Staff Unions and Associations (CCISUA), says it now cannot negotiate on key parts of staff terms and conditions, and its role has been “relegated to advising”.
Despite the danger in much of their work — the last decade has seen 555 staff attacked and 200 killed — Ban Ki-moon has stated that he will only “consult” unions on safety, security and welfare and will not negotiate.
The CCISUA points out that the UN wants to be able to cut costs by offshoring work to new service centres in cheap locations, and to make greater use of contractors with few or no labour rights.
CCISUA representative Ian Richards said: “If the UN starts ignoring international human and labour rights, why should your government bother upholding them?”
The unions are mounting a legal challenge, although this has to be limited to procedural issues. General secretaries of the TUC (Frances O’Grady) and the International TUC (Sharan Burrow) have written in support of the unions to Ban Ki-moon, but to no avail.