Norwegian teamsters need firing

The Norwegian Union for Transport Workers (Norwegian "Teamsters," if you will) have been on strike for some time, and Norwegians are running out of toilet paper and other necessities.

They are trying to force employers to pay non-union workers less than union workers. This is wrong and probably illegal. Here's why.

If the transport workers' union believe that it is OK to discriminate on pay based on union membership, they'd have to accept that this could work both ways. In other words, that employers should be allowed to pay non-union employees more than union employees. I would speculate that if employers tried to do this, there'd be something close to a general strike in Norway.

Also, since Norway provides employees the right to organize as a matter of human rights, it must follow that employees have an equal right to not organize. Penalizing workers in this way is a violation of their human rights.

Further, since wages between a company and a non-union worker is a contract between those two, the strike is an illegal interference between two contracting parties. It is, by definition, none of the labor union's business what transpires between an employer and a non-union employee.

If Norwegian employers and the courts had any guts, they'd rule that the strike is illegal, both because its basis isn't valid (you can't strike over other people's salary), and because it breaks a couple of other laws besides.

So what they should do is tell the strikers that they have 48 hours to consult with attorneys and show up for work, or they'll all be fired on their asses for cause, the matter being referred to the proper authorities for legal action.

Comments

[Jan Haugland]

And the chances of that happening is... pretty much nil, wount you say?

[Bjørn Stærk]

Lol - then we _would_ have a general strike on our hand. Our strikes work not only because the strikers are protected legally, (perhaps overstepping their rights here, but they still have a lot of rights), but also because they are protected culturally. The media outcry against a company attempting to fire these strikers for violating the right not to organize would cost that company a lot of money. Wouldn't work. These strikes won't stop until Norwegians stop excusing them, stop believing in the union myth. _Then_ we can reform the laws, balance the sides a bit.