The Viking Line Case, The Tor Caledonia Case, The Laval Case

By Niklas Bruun, Stellan Garde, Dan Holkie

One of the great challenges for unions in the Nordic countries, and other members of the European Union, is to protect and extend conditions.

The actions of companies based in Estonia whereby they seek to extend the lower wages and conditions to countries with better protection for workers. Seagoing workers have long been in the frontline in battles to maintain and get rights but the actions in Scandinavia and in the UK open new questions that are being taken up in European human rights courts. What legal protection do the European Articles on social rights and collective bargaining give workers?

The actions of Laval, a Latvian construction company in winning a tender in Stockholm on the basis of lower labour costs they think they can pay Latvian workers, coupled with the arrival of an anti-union government in Sweden means that the case has gone to the Swedish Labour Court. The unions in Sweden blockaded the site, leading to the bankruptcy of the company. Will the unions have to compensate the company? A dangerous precedent could be set.

(International Union Rights. vol. 13, issue 4, 2007)