Congress Briefs Dutch Unions on Crisis
21 Jun 2011
A senior delegation from the Irish Congress of Trade Unions will meet with their Dutch counterparts today (June 21) for talks about the Irish and European debt crisis and the response of unions.
The Congress delegation will meet key figures from the leadership of the FNV - the Federation of the Dutch Labour Movement - at their headquarters in Amsterdam. The FNV represents some 1.4 million unionised workers across all sectors of Dutch society.
The Congress delegation is comprised of President Jack O'Connor, General Secretary David Begg and Economic Advisor Paul Sweeney.
According to David Begg, the meeting is part of an ongoing initiative that is "designed to change the picture of Ireland abroad and to stress that the debt crisis is a European issue that needs to be resolved at an EU level. It cannot be corralled or quarantined in one country - the sickness is at the heart of the European financial system and that has to be addressed."
Congress has already met and briefed the leadership of Germany's main union federation, the DGB and that of Finland's leading labour federation, the SAK.
"The crisis in Ireland is a manifestation of a wider EU crisis and it requires resolution at that level. But three years on the only official response has been to ignore the problems in the financial sector and impose severe austerity programmes. That is entirely self-defeating," Mr Begg said.
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