“We’ve won”, claimed Skogen Lund, president of NHO (the Confederation of Norwegian Enterprise) and Gerd Kristiansen, president of LO (the Norwegian Confederation of Trade Unions) at the conclusion of a wage agreement on March 26, 2015. Expected to be difficult, the talks came to a successful conclusion and one that the LO had been preparing since February 17, 2015 when it put forward its demands. For the confederation it was as much a question of obtaining realistic wage rises as it was of sending a strong signal to the government in showing that the Norwegian model does indeed function and that it enables agreement over reasonable wage rises. This agreement provides a framework of wages rises with a ceiling of 2.7% that covers some 175,00 workers under both NHO and LO.
A complex context that weighs upon the nature of the demands. 2015 is a wage negotiation year but the LO is aware that the economy is not well placed for such measures. International growth has been weaker than normal and the Norwegian economy will soon be hit by the decline in the oil sector. Thus it was more a question of preparation and maintaining company competitiveness and aiming for long-term employment growth. But for LO it was also a question of find a way to reign back some of the...
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