Estonian Employees´ Unions´ Confederation TALO has
been established on September 28, 1992.
TALO is a central union composed of trade unions and the
associations of these working throughout
TALO has been established in order to represent and defend
the employees´ work, profession and income-related as well as economic, social,
educational and society-related interests and relevant rights through
co-operation.
TALO's objectives are:
Ä to defend and represent the employees´ work,
profession, income and education-related
as well as economic and social rights and interests before employers,
the associations of these, state and local authorities and other institutions
and the associations and central unions of the latter;
Ä to be a partner in social dialogue to the employers,
the associations of these, local authorities, the institutions, associations
and central unions of these, the Government of Estonia, the ministries and
institutions at defending and representing the rights and interests of its
members;
Ä to develop co-operation between its members and to
strive for the execution and strengthening of the principles of social justice;
Ä to execute the trade union rights of the employees, in
particular the right to bargain collectively over the conditions of their life,
work, profession, salaries etc;
Ä to defend the employees´ rights before court, organisations dealing with work issues and
arguments, institutions of state and local authorities and the associations of
these;
Ä to actively take part in the working out of
trade-related requirements, in activities related to recognising, ascribing and
executing trades;
Ä to develop and activate the co-operation and
solidarity between the employees;
Ä to develop and strengthen the co-operation between
employers and employees in order to improve the employees´ work, profession and
trade-related as well as economic and social conditions and to raise the
quality, effectiveness and productivity of their work;
Ä to collaborate and develop connections with trade
unions, other NGOs and persons not in
the government in
Ä in co-operation with other countries´ free trade unions to defend all the people's
right to education, work and social security.
In order to achieve its objectives, TALO is competent to:
Ä hold negotiations between two or more parties on the
national level and to contract collective agreements concerning work relations,
working conditions and pay as well as other trade-related questions or these
concerning education, including additional and re-schooling and economic, social and other issues;
Ä contract the agreements necessary for the activities
of TALO;
Ä represent its members´ common interests before
employers, the associations and central unions of these, before courts and
organisations dealing with work issues and arguments and before other state and
local authorities´ institutions, before the associations of the latter and
other institutions;
Ä co-ordinate the co-operation of its member unions, to
represent and defend their interests and rights;
Ä keep a watch on the employers, state institutions,
local authorities and the associations of these on how they follow the work
laws, collective and work contracts and other agreements contracted with the
trade union;
Ä suggest the terminating of the activities by employers
and other persons and institutions that harass the lawful rights of the
employees;
Ä solve work-related arguments and represent its members
in such cases;
Ä apply for the considering of the rise of the cost of
living in income-related political agreements, on adopting and changing
socio-economic warranties;
Ä apply for the improving of the situation of the
working conditions and health protection and to take part in activities related
to labour protection;
Ä analyse the
conditions of the main trades of its members at the labour market and according
to the analysis to try and promote the professional status of the respective
trades at the labour market;
Ä apply for the adopting, cancelling and changing of
legal acts concerning work relationships, the situation at the labour market
and social issues, to take part in the
working out of legal acts, to participate in motion-preparing commissions;
Ä to use other credentials according to the trade union law and other laws.
TALO will accept as its members: trade unions working
throughout Estonia, associations of trade unions, other national organisations
established to represent and defend the interests of the employees, who
recognise and are willing to follow the Constitution of TALO and its action
programmes. TALO is composed of employees working in the fields of education,
culture, media, agriculture, sports, science, technology and health care. On
January 1, 2005, TALO had approximately 30,000 members.
The
work of TALO is organised through the General Assembly and the Executive Board.
The General Assembly that unites all the member organisations sets forth the
perspective and yearly action programmes and gives the Executive Board
credentials to act based on the adopted action programmes.
In
order to achieve its objectives, TALO has been taking part in negotiations
between two and three parties since the year 1993 and in the Socio-economic
Committee since the year 1999. Over the course of developing the social
dialogue, TALO has contracted agreements between two and more parties with the
Government of Estonia, the associations of local authorities, employers and
other NGOs. TALO co-operates with all the political parties, at the same time
retaining political freedom.
Through
its main activities, TALO aims to solve the problems of its members concerning
their work, pay, holidays and social warranties and to protect social justice.
In financial matters, TALO follows the principle of motivating quality labour
with better skills and more knowledge. In labour market issues TALO supports
active labour policy and the importance of additional and re-schooling. In the
field of social security, TALO follows the demands of the Improved and
Implemented European Social Charter and the European Code of Social Security.
The organisation pays much attention to creating a positively inclining working
environment.
TALO
has actively taken part in the working out of the conceptions of medical
security and the pension reform as well as in solving the problems that are of
interest to us through creating the laws.
Upon
need TALO has used protest actions of the employees. For example in the year
1997, when the Government did not fulfil the contracted salary agreement and
refused to bargain over these issues the following year, a warning strike was
organised, which 17,000 intellectuals took part in. According to the principle
of solidarity, TALO has also supported the protest actions of other trade
unions.
TALO
has paid much attention to improving and implementing its members´ legal and
trade union related knowledge. The
topic that has got the most attention is the supervision over the preparing,
contracting and fulfilling the collective agreements. As a result of this, the
contracting of collective agreements has increased and by means of that, so
have the work relations between the employees and employers based on social
dialogue and mutual trust.
Organising
its work, TALO has followed the principles of activity of the ILO as well as
internationally recognised trade unions such as ETUC, ICFTU and NFS. In May
1999, TALO was accepted as an observing member of ETUC. In November 2002, TALO
was taken into affiliation. The principle direction of the foreign affairs of
TALO are the Northern Countries. In our activities this far we have mostly
followed the experience of SACO in Sweden and AKAVA in Finland. Our activities
and contacts have spread from the afore-mentioned two countries to other
European trade union organisations. From the year 1999 TALO takes part in the
work of the Baltic Trade Union Council.
Aadress: Gonsiori 21, 10147 Tallinn.
Tel: 6 419 800, talo@talo.ee