The long-awaited news is that UPM and the Finnish Paperworkers' Union have finally reached an agreement: the strike that has been holding up deliveries of graphic paper, cardboard and labels throughout Europe is over and the 2,000 Finnish employees have returned to work.
The conciliator yesterday submitted five proposals for collective labour agreements for the five UPM Group companies - UPM Pulp, UPM Communication Papers, UPM Specialty Papers, UPM Raflatac and UPM Biofuels. The paper company's management and the union announced today that they have approved the proposals.
The union had refused last week to the four collective bargaining proposals were rejected because none of them concerned UPM Communication Papers, UPM's graphic paper division.
These five collective bargaining agreements replace the old and only paper industry agreement dating back to the 1940s.
The contract period for these new agreements is four years. Wage increases are in line with current schedules, and wage reviews will be negotiated after the first two years. The new agreements are structurally less complicated than the old ones, and the number of pages is about half that of the previous ones, according to UPM.
"During the negotiations, many aspects of the contracts were examined from a completely new perspective. It was a long process, but in the end we were able to agree on employment conditions that take into account the needs and particularities of our business. The new conditions improve the productivity and competitiveness of the companies and plants and also ensure good conditions for the employees." said Jyrki Hollmén, vice president of labor markets at UPM.
All these company agreements introduce hourly rather than periodic pay. Hourly wages are paid according to the work done, and the new collective labor agreements allow for competence and performance to be taken into account in the formulation of wages. All companies have also agreed to greater flexibility in the organization of shifts and the use of working time.
The strike at almost all of UPM's Finnish mills began on January 1, 2022 and lasted 112 days, or almost four months.
