Trade Union News from Finland

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ISSN 1458-4433

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The news service is sponsored by SAK, the largest central trade union in Finland, and ten of its 23 affiliated unions.

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Estonian accession to the EU:
One in two Estonian workers interested in working abroad

Helsinki (03.06.2002 - Juhani Artto) A new survey finds that as of March 2002 about 40,000 of the 1.1 million Estonians have worked in Finland. Half of these workers have experience of working illegally in the Finnish labour market. The survey was conducted by the Finland Gallup organisation and commissioned by the largest Finnish central trade union organisation - SAK.

Should Estonia become a Member State of the European Union, 48 per cent of Estonians are interested in working abroad. The most favoured host country would be Germany (17 per cent). Finland was nominated the most attractive foreign country to work in by 10 per cent of the Estonians. Sweden scored the number one position in 7 per cent of responses.

SAK establishes
a service point
in Tallinn

Next autumn SAK will establish a service point in the Estonian capital Tallinn. The function of the service point will be to advise Estonian workers about working abroad. These workers will receive information on employment opportunities in Finland, Finnish labour legislation and working conditions, labour market rules, and employee organising. The project, which is financed in part by the Finnish authorities and the EU Interreg 3 A programme, will last until 2006.

About 55,000 Estonians consider it likely that they will work occasionally in Finland if Estonia joins the EU. This figure has decreased by about 30 per cent since the previous survey in 2000. Currently about 22,000 Estonians believe that they could settle in and work permanently in Finland following Estonian accession.

The Estonians who are most willing to work in Finland are young people below 25 years of age, students and the unemployed. Estonia's Russian-speaking population have a higher interest in working in Finland than the ethnic Estonians.

More than one third ready to work illegally

According to the survey, 35 per cent would accept illegal work. Slightly more (37 per cent) would work as much overtime as the employer required. Both rates have decreased since previous studies. One quarter (23 per cent) could work with no job security. A majority (60 per cent) think that pay must be equal to that of Finnish workers. More than one in four (28 per cent) could work for pay below the levels paid to Finnish workers.

Gallup Finland also surveyed the attitudes of the Finns. Roughly half of the working population (46 per cent) fears that Estonian membership of the EU would weaken the employment situation in Finland. However, 32 per cent believe that more Estonians working in Finland would strengthen Finland's competitiveness and economic welfare.

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