Author: Eric Lee

One of the largest unions in Canada has just made a generous donation to LabourStart and I wanted to share with you what they wrote to us:

On behalf of the 450,000 members of the National Union of Public and General Employees (NUPGE), I am pleased to confirm our donation to LabourStart.

LabourStart stands among the world’s foremost organizations for campaigning and information advocacy on labour issues. We deeply appreciate your ongoing efforts to build solidarity, rally support, and amplify voices from workers’ struggles both at home and abroad. Through your grassroots actions and campaigns, LabourStart empowers everyday people to take meaningful action in the pursuit of social and economic justice.

We appreciate the support LabourStart has provided in building solidarity when our members have been locked out or on strike. The pressure LabourStart brings through campaigns during a dispute has been appreciated; it is something our union could not do on its own.

This is why LabourStart exists.

Right now we’re gearing up for what promises to be one of our most important campaigns ever — in support of the jailed leader of the trade union movement in Hong Kong, Lee Cheuk-yan.  Some of you may have met Lee; he was a keynote speaker at the LabourStart Global Solidarity Conference a decade ago in Toronto.

And we’re getting ready to participate in the People’s Climate Summit which will take place in Turkey at the same time as COP 31, the UN’s annual climate meeting.

For the last 28 years, we’ve been supporting working people and their unions around the world with our campaigns, news, podcasts, conferences, books and much more.

I’m writing to ask you to generously donate to LabourStart.  And to ask you to ask your union to follow the example of NUPGE and make a donation that will make a real difference.

Please click here and give what you can.

Thank you!

Eric Lee

LabourStart

Based on the application submitted by members of the Georgian Taxi Drivers Association (a member organization of the Trade Union “Labor”), the Labor Inspection Service of the Ministry of Internally Displaced Persons from the Occupied Territories, Labour, Health and Social Affairs of Georgia has classified the activity of passenger transport as heavy, harmful, and hazardous work. Consequently, vehicle drivers in Georgia will be entitled to an additional 10 days of paid leave.

Members of the Trade Union “Labor” applied to the Labor Inspection Service for clarification regarding the classification of passenger transport activities as heavy, harmful, and hazardous work, and the entitlement to an additional 10 days of leave.

The Labor Inspection Service promptly reviewed the application submitted by the members of the Georgian Taxi Drivers Association and noted that the list of heavy, harmful, and hazardous jobs is approved by Order No. 147/n of the Minister of Labour, Health and Social Affairs of Georgia dated May 3, 2007, “On the Approval of the List of Heavy, Harmful and Hazardous Jobs” (hereinafter referred to as “Order No. 147/n”).

Article 481 of Annex No. 1 to Order No. 147/n (“List of Heavy, Harmful and Hazardous Jobs”) defines the activities of persons employed in motor transport. These include, inter alia, bus drivers employed on regular routes and repair work, car drivers—including those with special carrying capacities (from 1.5 to 3 tons; 3 tons and above)—and taxi drivers employed in republican cities, regional district jurisdictions, and on international routes. Additionally, Article 515 of the same annex includes tram and trolleybus drivers.

Furthermore, the supervisory authority noted that according to the list of increased-risk, heavy, harmful, and hazardous jobs approved by Resolution No. 381 of the Government of Georgia of July 27, 2018, “On the Approval of the List of Increased-Risk, Heavy, Harmful and Hazardous Jobs” (hereinafter referred to as “Resolution No. 381”), activities related to urban and suburban passenger land transport (H.49.31.0) are classified as increased-risk, heavy, harmful, and hazardous work. In accordance with the list of national economy sectors defined by Resolution No. 10 of the Board of the National Statistics Office of Georgia (LEPL GeoStat) of June 28, 2016, “On the Approval of the National Classifier of Georgia ‘SEK 006-2016 Types of Economic Activity'” (hereinafter referred to as “Resolution No. 10”), code No. 49.31.0 of the national classifier of types of economic activity covers land transport of passengers through urban or suburban transport systems. This may include various types of land transport, such as minibuses, taxis, buses, cutters, trams, trolleys, subways, elevated railways, and the like.

Regarding persons employed in heavy, harmful, and hazardous work, subparagraph “a” of Paragraph 3 of Article 31 of the Organic Law of Georgia “The Labour Code of Georgia” is also important, according to which any employee performing heavy, harmful, or hazardous work is granted an additional 10 calendar days of paid leave per year.

The Labor Inspection Service determined that any employer engaged in heavy, harmful, or hazardous work is obligated to provide employees with the rights defined by labor legislation and comply with other requirements established by Georgian legislation.

We thank the International Center for Rights Protection for providing legal support and partnership.

Kuehne+Nagel Korea is a union-shop workplace that had maintained stable labour relations without a full-scale strike for approximately 20 years. However, after a new managing director took office in March 2026, the company proposed 48 amendments covering 25 clauses of the existing collective agreement.

Several of these proposals would significantly affect union membership, the status of elected union officers, union finances and the ability of the union and its parent organisation to conduct legitimate activities.

The dispute is therefore not primarily about wages or benefits. The central issue is whether a valid, long-standing collective agreement and the union rights established under it will continue to be respected following a change in local management.

The union completed the legally required mediation and ballot procedures. Of 195 eligible members, 193 voted—a turnout of 99.0%—and 179 members, or 92.7%, supported industrial action.

Union members staged a full-scale strike on 15 and 16 July 2026. Since 25 July, they have continued industrial action by declining overtime, public-holiday, weekend and standby duties until a settlement is reached.

During the strike, the union also obtained documents and reports suggesting that personnel from overseas Kuehne+Nagel entities and external contractors may have performed work affected by the industrial action. Evidence relating to specific cases has been submitted to the relevant Korean authorities for investigation and legal assessment.

The union is calling on Kuehne+Nagel to:

* respect the existing collective agreement and Korean labour law;

* withdraw proposals that would significantly restrict union membership and legitimate union activities;

* clarify transparently the involvement of overseas and external personnel during the strike; and

* resume substantive collective bargaining without delay.

The union remains ready to negotiate and is seeking the restoration of stable labour relations based on Korean law, the collective agreement and mutual respect.

In solidarity,

Chanyoung Heo

Branch President

Kuehne+Nagel Korea Labour Union

Korean Public Service and Transport Workers’ Union

My name is Joseph Ndiritu Karobia, General Secretary of the Public Transport Operators Union (PUTON) that represents road transport workers in Kenya.

We also draw membership from the informal public transport sector locally referred to as Matatu sector. I previously worked in the matatu industry rising through the ranks until when I quit to represent workers in their registered trade union PUTON.

We recruited 209 members from Kariobangi Matatu Owners Sacco (SACCO) over a period between 2015 where we had a dispute that we won at the Ministry of Labour and in the period 2021//2022, we further recruited members from the same SACCO which we again forced the union go to court, a matter that was concluded in favor of the union PUTON.

Orders were issued by the court, among which they were ordered to deduct and remit union dues for members who had subscribed to be members of the union. They did not obey the order and we took SACCO to court for contempt and disobeying court orders. They are now forcing union members to sign an affidavit claiming that they signed the union check-off forms without knowing what they were signing. Our next date in court will be on 04 October 2026 for the contempt matter.

The SACCO was squarely put by the court that it is the employer for the drivers and conductors and many other categories of workers who service the informal matatu sector.

We need your support in this matter, we need to tell the SACCO that every worker has a right to join a union, we need solidarity from global unionisable workers in this war.

It’s always great to hear that a LabourStart campaign has helped workers to win.

And that’s why I want to share with you the good news from a group of Italian teachers who went on strike a few months ago.

Those teachers have now won. They have a collective bargaining agreement (CBA). And to celebrate their victory, they issued a statement thanking LabourStart for the help we were able to provide.

It begins by thanking us:

“We would like to thank you and LabourStart for your incredible support during the Italian High School strike. This campaign has been a milestone for the union movement in Turkey. For the very first time, a strike was launched in a private school, mobilizing a highly educated and distinct segment of the working class.”

It continues:

“Most importantly, thanks to LabourStart, our voice reached across the globe in multiple languages. The international solidarity messages you helped generate traveled all the way to our picket-line, giving us the strength to carry on.”

You can read their statement in full here:

“We made history” – statement of the Turkish teachers at Liceo Italiano I.M.I.

And I want to thank you — because you have made our work possible.

Right now we need your support more than ever before. We know that working people and our unions are all facing financial problems. And that’s why some have had to cut back.

We keep our expenses to a minimum. Almost all the work on LabourStart is done by volunteers. We don’t have a physical office. And we’ve managed to do this for more than 28 years, even as other online projects have had to close down due to lack of funds.

If you can make a donation of any amount today, it would help us during this difficult moment.

Please click here to support LabourStart.

Thank you very much!

Eric Lee
LabourStart

We would like to thank you and LabourStart for your incredible support during the Italian High School strike.

This campaign has been a milestone for the union movement in Turkey. For the very first time, a strike was launched in a private school, mobilizing a highly educated and distinct segment of the working class.

We set up our strike tent and raised our flags at the gates of a prestigious school in the heart of the city. We spent over 100 days on the picket line under continuous police surveillance, but we were sustained by the incredible solidarity and love of our students.

At the end of these 100 days, we successfully reached a verbal agreement, though it has not yet been officially signed by the Italian authorities. Throughout this journey, the support from students, parents, and fellow trade unions was immense.

Most importantly, thanks to LabourStart, our voice reached across the globe in multiple languages. The international solidarity messages you helped generate traveled all the way to our picket-line, giving us the strength to carry on.

This has been an invaluable experience for us. We made history by organizing the first strike in the private education sector, and we are now on the verge of signing the first-ever collective bargaining agreement in a foreign school in Turkey.

We hope to share the final, signed good news with you very soon.

Thank you once again for standing with us.

Long live international solidarity! Long live our strike! Viva la solidarietà internazionale! Viva lo sciopero!

With the slogan Justice 4 Pawel, nearly 5,000 trade unionists worldwide spoke up through a LabourStart campaign against the dismissal of union leader Pawel Rudzki in the Netherlands. Last Friday, April 17th, Pawel won his case in court and won his job back. Finally there is Justice 4 Pawel !

Pawel and his colleagues thank you all!

Without your support, this victory would not have been possible. Together with the support from Dutch activists who organized countless actions at the shops of Albert Heijn, the supermarket that fired him from their warehouse, there was continued attention for his case and the judge had to face the reality of union opression against migrant workers like Pawel.

The judge rules that:

• It was not even allowed to hire Pawel via a temp agency for more than 3 years
• Pawel will get a permanent contract directly with the company, dating 5 years back
• Pawel will get reinstated in his old job with the security of a permanent contract
• Pawel will get back-payments for all missed salary that was caused by being a temp agency worker instead of directly employed

This means that for the first time in Dutch history a judge says clearly: using temp agency workers without job security is abuse of legal loopholes and not allowed if it lasts longer than 3 years.

Hundreds of thousands of migrant workers in The Netherlands are in insecure agency jobs even though they work is available year round. With this ruling they stand strong to claim a secure contract. 

Pawel says: “I knew this was wrong. It was long overdue that Dutch companies start giving us the respect that we deserve.”

Source: FNV.

Will you support us?

2026 is going to be a challenging year for the world’s trade unions. Right-wing, anti-union governments are becoming more common. The world grows increasingly unstable. Workers need powerful unions now more than ever.

LabourStart is there, every day of the year, doing what we can to support working people and their unions.

Please click here to donate.

In 2025, we ran fifteen campaigns in support of workers and their unions in Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Guatemala, Lesotho, the Netherlands, the Philippines, Serbia, Sri Lanka, Türkiye, and the USA. Many of those campaigns were run in partnership with global and European labour federations, including the Education International, ETF, IndustriALL, PSI and UNI Global Union, as well as local unions.

In addition, our network of hundreds of volunteer correspondents posted over 38,000 news stories in 2025, in dozens of languages. LabourStart remains the best place online to find out news about workers and their unions.

Our podcast series continues to grow its base of regular listeners and this year featured a number of trade union leaders and activists from around the world — including Azerbaijan, Belarus, Canada, Lesotho, the Netherlands, Norway, Serbia, Turkey, and the USA.

In 2026, we’ll be growing our network of volunteer correspondents and translators, preparing for a LabourStart Global Solidarity Conference in 2027, doing many more podcasts and campaigns — basically doing whatever we can to help.

To continue this work, we rely on the ongoing support we’ve received from you.

Please click here to donate.

These are difficult times for working people as we face rising costs. I wish we didn’t have to ask, but we do. LabourStart urgently needs your donations to ensure that our work continues uninterrupted, especially during the coming weeks and months.

We hope that we can continue to count on your support.

Thank you!

Eric Lee

LabourStart

The 16th Jubilee Congress of the Georgian Trade Union Confederation (GTUC) celebrating 120 years of trade union history in Georgia, was held on October 24, 2025. 175 delegates and more than 50 invited local and international guests, including those from trade unions from various countries, participated in the congress.

The congress featured a presentation of the new anthem of the Georgian Trade Union Confederation and a film depicting the history of the Georgian trade union movement.

International and local guests and representatives of trade unions of various countries greeted the congress.

The congress heard and adopted the 2021-2025 report of the Georgian Trade Union Confederation, which included the GTUC activities in the areas of workers’ protection, legislative and analytical work, awareness-raising, international activities and labour safety. The congress focused on the importance of the country’s European integration in ensuring decent labour standards for workers. According to the report:

During the reporting period, the GTUC was involved in and prepared more than 10 legislative initiatives, which concerned issues such as: a package of amendments to the Organic Law of Georgia “Labour Code of Georgia”, including in the direction of ensuring women’s rights and gender equality, minimum wage, unemployment benefits and unemployment insurance, labour migration, labour safety, etc;

During this period, the Legal Department provided consultations to more than 45,100 people. 97% of labour disputes were resolved in favour of workers, as a result of which they received various types of compensation, the total amount of which during the reporting period amounted to 4,200,225 GEL;

As a result of collective negotiations, collective agreements and mediation, workers received economic benefits, the total amount of which exceeds 440 million GEL;

514 information meetings (trainings, seminars) were held, in which 11,822 people (workers, civil servants, employers, students, journalists, lawyers, etc.) participated. The topics of the meetings were: labour rights, labour safety, social protection, women’s rights and gender equality, civil servants’ rights, labour standards in the European integration process, etc;

38 trainers were trained, who are actively participating in awareness-raising and organizing areas;

Were prepared: 16 information brochures/bulletins, 35 videos, 230 information cards, 44 open offices, which reached more than 12,000 people;

The GTUC hosted as well as participated in 212 international events, with involvement of 1,329 representatives of the GTUC and its sectoral organizations.

The Congress heard the report of the Control and Revision Commission of the Georgian Trade Union Confederation (GTUC) on the work done. It also adopted a number of resolutions, including a special resolution on the special status of the trade unions of the autonomous republics of Adjara and Abkhazia in the structure of the Georgian Trade Union Confederation and on the formation of a unified, consolidated and mutual-solidarity trade union movement.

The Congress, for the first time in the history of the Georgian trade union movement, held elections with a new structure, where the GTUC will be led by a General Secretary and a President instead of a Chairman. Irakli Petriashvili was elected General Secretary of the GTUC by secret ballot, and Raisa Liparteliani was elected President. The positions of Deputy General Secretaries were held by Tamar Surmava and Lavrenti Alania.

The Georgian Trade Unions Confederation adopted an action programme for 2026-2029, according to which, over the next 4 years, the GTUC will work on issues such as:

Minimum wage;

Amendments to labour legislation to ensure compliance with ILO and EU standards;

Progressive taxation;

Subsistence allowance;

Reduction of income inequality;

Poverty alleviation;

Formalization of informal employment;

Labour migration;

Protection of women’s labour rights and encouragement of their economic activity;

Climate change and just transition;

Pensions;

Protection of the interests of youth and other vulnerable groups;

Improvement of active labour market policy mechanisms;

Improving rights and social situation of those employed in the care economy and digital labour platforms;

Improving vocational education system;

Ratifying a number of ILO conventions related to women’s rights and labour safety, etc.

At the end of the congress, 30 trade union members employed in various fields were awarded for their outstanding contribution to trade union activities.

It should be noted that the Congress was preceded by a conference on October 23 titled “120-Year History of Georgian Trade Unions, Modern Challenges and Ways to Solve Them”, where participants were provided with information about the history of the Georgian trade union movement and were also given the opportunity to discuss modern challenges in the field of labour.

We hereby invite representatives and employees of trade unions throughout the world to nominate candidates for next year’s award of the Arthur Svensson international prize for trade union rights. The deadline is 1st of January 2026.

Since 2010 the Svensson prize has been awarded to persons and organisations that has worked predominately to promote trade union rights and organizing around the world. Amongst the previous winners we find leaders and activists of the teachers’ union in Bahrain, the Miners union in Mexico, textile workers in Cambodia, health workers in Liberia, independent trade unions in Belarus and Kazakhstan, trade union leader and activist Khaing Zar Aung from Myanmar and many more. This year Aliaksandr Yarashuk, President of the Belarusian Congress of Democratic Trade Unions (BKDP) and member of the ILO Governing body, was awarded the prize.

The prize amount is NOK 500,000 (approx. USD 46.000). One half of the amount goes directly to the prize winner and the other half will be spent on projects related to the prize winner.  

The nomination deadline is January the 1st 2026, but we encourage to start the nomination process as soon as possible. The nominees will be judged on to what extent the person or organization has promoted union rights and/or union organizing in the world. 

More on the award here
Previous winners here

For justified nominations please use this form. Nominations can also be sent with attachments to arthur.svenssonprize@styrke.no . 

Thank you!

In solidarity,

Amalie Hilde Tofte

Secretary of the prize committee