Trade unions are largely being abolished in that “democracy” for whose war NATO countries are expending their civilian populations’ blood and treasure. A draft law which has passed Ukraine’s unicameral parliament will remove union membership and collective bargaining rights for some 70% of all Ukrainian workers, and seize union property. Thus another step is taken which echoes those of the Nazis after March 1933.
The British left publication Morning Star, “openDemocracy,” Progressive International, and others reported on Aug. 23 that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had ratified Draft Law 5371 after the government majority passed it in the Verkhovna Rada. The law, “On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts To Simplify the Regulation of Labor Relations in Small and Medium Enterprises and Reduce Administrative Burdens on Business,” has been exposed and protested by the International and European Trades Union Congresses (ITUC and ETUC), and the International Labor Organization (ILO), as well as the Confederation of Free Trade Unions of Ukraine. (https://kvpu.org.ua/en/news/5357-information-on-draft-laws-no-5371-and-no-5054-1). The ITUC and ETUC wrote to Zelenskyy, unsuccessfully, calling on him not to sign it.
To protest the Draft Law 5371 by the ILO:
It bans collective bargaining for employees of companies of 250 workers or less, authorizing companies to make individual contracts with each worker, on the “zero hours” basis which allows companies to vary workers’ hours at random according to management needs;
