Definitive Report - Report No 34, 1960

Case No 188 (Denmark) - Complaint date: 25-OCT-58 - Closed

1. 27. The complaint of the Swiss Printing Workers' Union and the Swiss Federation of National Christian Trade Unions is contained in two communications addressed directly to the I.L.O on 25 October and 2 December 1958 respectively.

A. A. The complainants' allegations

1. 28. It is alleged that a Swiss printer, Mr. Paul Rück, went to Copenhagen on 18 August 1958, under the Swiss-Danish Agreement respecting the exchange of young workers. Mr. Rück belonged to the Swiss Printing Workers' Union, a Christian organisation which is not recognised by the Danish Printers' Federation. For this reason, it is alleged, the Federation prevented the employer in Copenhagen from employing Mr. Wick by threatening to call a strike if he did, but later agreed to his taking a job outside Copenhagen on condition that he joined the Swiss Printers' Federation when he returned to Switzerland. The complainants annex to their complaint copies of letters exchanged between the employer in question, the complainant, the State Emigration Office and the Handicrafts Council, Copenhagen, and different Swiss and Danish authorities and diplomatic representatives, all of which purport to confirm the facts set forth in the allegations and the fact that Mr. Rück had proceeded to Copenhagen in due accordance with the procedure for the exchange of young workers. The complainants argue that the exclusion of Mr. Rück from his job because he belonged to a Christian trade union in Switzerland, as a result of which the Danish Federation would not accept him as a member, infringes Article 1 of the Right to Organise and Collective Bargaining Convention, 1949 (No. 98). They argue further that the subsequent attempt by the said Federation to cause him to join the Swiss Printers' Federation meant a refusal of his right to remain loyal to his Christian trade union and, therefore, infringes the Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organise Convention, 1948 (No. 87).
2. 29. In its communication dated 17 January 1959, the Danish Government confirms the facts of the case as given by the complainant. The Government states that the Danish Printers' Federation has a reciprocal agreement with the Swiss Printers' Federation under which workers being exchanged are assisted by the respective unions. There is no such agreement between the Danish Federation and the Swiss Printing Workers' Union. Mr. Rück has now joined the Swiss Printers' Federation, so that the reasons which occasioned his earlier difficulties no longer exist.
3. 30. The Government explains further that if the employer in Copenhagen had, at the outset, informed the Danish Employers' Confederation of the position, the latter could have brought the case before the Permanent Court of Arbitration in Denmark, under Act No. 536 of 4 October 1919, on the ground that the action of the Danish Printers' Federation was a breach of the basic " September Agreement " concluded in 1899 between the central workers' and employers' organisations of Denmark. This remedy was not pursued.
4. 31. Finally, the Government refers to Case No. 120 (France) examined by the Committee on Freedom of Association, in which the Committee, having regard to the Report of its Committee on Industrial Relations adopted by the International Labour Conference at its 32nd Session in 1949, declined to regard union security arrangements as contrary to the Right to Organise and Collective Bargaining Convention, 1949 (No. 98).

B. B. The Committee's conclusions

1. 32. Both the Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organise Convention, 1948 (No. 87), and the Right to Organise and Collective Bargaining Convention, 1949 (No. 98), have been ratified by Denmark.
2. 33. Article 1 of the latter Convention provides that workers shall enjoy adequate protection against acts of anti-union discrimination in respect of their employment and, in particular, acts calculated to make the employment of a worker subject to the condition that he shall not join a union or shall relinquish trade union membership, or to cause the dismissal of or otherwise prejudice a worker by reason of union membership.

The Committee's recommendations

1. 34. In a number of previous cases, the Committee has declined to entertain allegations relating to union security arrangements, basing its reasoning on the statement in the report of the Committee on Industrial Relations set up by the International Labour Conference in 1949 that the Convention in question could in no way be interpreted as authorising or prohibiting union security arrangements, such questions being matters for regulation in accordance with national practice. In the present case, however, it is clear that the action taken by the Danish Printers' Federation, because it had entered into an inter-union agreement with the Swiss Printers' Federation but not with the Swiss Printing Workers' Union, was not taken pursuant to any actual union security agreement concluded with the organisation of which the Danish employer concerned was a member. The action taken, in fact, seems to have had its origin in the inter-union rivalry of two organisations of different tendencies in Switzerland, with only one of which the Danish trade union concerned has relations. But a situation was examined by the Committee on Freedom of Association in Case No. 182 relating to the United Kingdom in which there were many analogies with the present case. In Case No. 182, no union security arrangements were in force pursuant to any agreement between the union and the employers' organisation concerned ; rather, it appeared that an inter-union dispute existed because one union " was exerting pressure to secure what, if it should be successful, would be a closed shop and a union security arrangement in fact ". The Committee, even in the absence of an actual union security agreement, took the view that the case was " essentially one revolving around an inter-union dispute over the issue of union security " and recommended the Governing Body to decide that the case did not call for further examination. In the present case the Committee comes to the same conclusion and for the same reasons. The Committee, therefore, recommends the Governing Body to decide that the case does not call for further examination.
   • Geneva, 4 March 1959. (Signed) Paul RAMADIER, Chairman.