Cuts for all

The employer can lay off an employee tempo­ra­rily, based on the rules stipu­lated in the Finnish law, either for a fixed-term period or until further notice. This can happen by reducing working hours or inter­rup­ting the work completely.

Even when payment of wage or salary is stopped, the emplo­y­ment relationship remains in effect in other respects. For the loss in pay, an employee can get earnings-related allowance for the period of the lay-off. For Industrial Union members, this is paid by the A‑kassa unemplo­y­ment fund.

This system is a combi­na­tion of flexi­bi­lity for compa­nies in difficult times and security for emplo­yees. For workers, it also gives the possi­bi­lity to return to the job of their own competence.

This system is a combi­na­tion of flexi­bi­lity for compa­nies in difficult times and security for employees.

Now, due to the right-wing govern­ment cuts in emplo­y­ment security, the system is being tested. With the new smaller unemplo­y­ment benefits, emplo­yees might choose to move to another job during the tempo­rary lay-off time. Even some emplo­yers have been worried that compe­tent emplo­yees could leave.

At the same time, the govern­ment makes it more difficult for emplo­yees to adapt to the changes. Before reducing the workforce, a company with at least 20 emplo­yees is obligated to hold coope­ra­tion negotia­tions, under Finnish law. The negotia­tions could take from two to six weeks and the tempo­rary lay-offs must be announced at least two weeks in advance.

This will change, too, with the new Orpo-Purra Govern­ment policy. In future, the length of time for coope­ra­tion negotia­tions will be halved. Also, these negotia­tions will only apply to much bigger compa­nies i.e. those emplo­ying at least 50 emplo­yees. The notice period for tempo­rary lay-offs will be cut in half, to seven days.

All this leaves signi­ficantly less time for emplo­yees to be prepared and organise their life during possible lay-offs.

This will happen

It will cut the earnings-related unemplo­y­ment allowance, make it more difficult to get it and freeze the index increases. The changes will concern the unemployed, those tempo­ra­rily laid-off and part-time workers.

Some of the cuts are already in place. From the begin­ning of this year, the waiting period for unemplo­y­ment benefits has been raised from five to seven days.

In April, child supple­ments in unemplo­y­ment benefits will be abolished. The practice, whereby the unemployed can earn 300 euro a month without cuts in his/​her allowance, will be terminated.

In Autumn, the earnings-related unemplo­y­ment benefit will be cut by 20 per cent after two months of unemplo­y­ment. After eight months, it will be cut by an additional five per cent.

All of these cuts will hit those tempo­ra­rily laid off, too.

Tekijä Magazine asked A‑kassa unemplo­y­ment fund to find out the average length of the Industrial Union members’ tempo­rary lay-offs. Based on an approxi­mate sample, this is on average 18 days, inclu­ding weekends. The median time is 12 days. The median is the middle value in a set of data from smallest to largest.