The thirteen Finnish unions in UNI, representing more than half a million organised workers and salaried staff, emphasise the need to strengthen global solidarity. The spirit of solidarity in Finland is clear: the problems of employees in one country are the concern of all UNI organisations all over the world.

The organising rate in Finland is well over 80 per cent and there is a long tradition of a strong trade union presence. This means that the Finns do not expect to be mainly at the receiving end within UNI, but to play the role of giving support to others. Despite this, however, there are increasingly many examples of how the globalisation of business enterprises also constitutes a threat to workers in Finland in the industries covered by UNI.

Finland is also no stranger to deregulation, privatisation, subcontracting and an increase in atypical, transient forms of employment which threaten to undermine the rights of individual workers and their prospects of securing and retaining decent jobs.

Finland's banking sector employees have endured bitter experiences in the 1990s of how quickly the computerisation of services and the pressure of global competition may erode their employment opportunities.

Now a similar threat - in the form of e-commerce - hangs over employees in the commercial sector. "For us, the new technology is a challenge. An absolutely necessary conclusion is closer cross-border cooperation between union movements", says Commercial Workers' Union leader and ex-president of FIET, Maj-Len Remahl.

On the other hand, modern technology may also benefit the trade unions.

The Finns are delighted with UNI's significant investment in the most modern communication tools. They consider this to be highly promising as the entire organisation, from the headquarters staff in Switzerland to the rank-and-file on all continents, will now be well informed of all important events in the UNI industries. This improves the prospects for rapid and effective action against the repression of workers, even in the places most distant from the world's great metropoli.

Trade union traditions of action differ from country to country. One of the top officials in the graphical workers' union, Christian Bäcklund, believes that unions have much to learn from each other. UNI's improved communication framework is also a favourable starting point in this respect.

One example which Bäcklund gives of the importance of constant exchange of information is the need to fight any attempts to dump pay levels as a form of competition between international corporations.

The Finnish UNI affiliates shared their views at a recent press conference in Helsinki.