For unions and workers, the climate crisis is central to the worldwide struggle for decent sustainable work and liveable communities. The climate crisis threatens the planet and if not addressed will negatively impact the world and all of our lives. “Extreme weather events with lasting devastation are already destroying jobs and livelihoods. … There are no jobs on a dead planet - the alternative is to build good jobs on a living planet.”
The Women’s Environmental and Development Organisation adds that “[t]he impacts of climate change are not felt equally. Without measures to address the injustice of climate change, those with the fewest resources, countries, and individuals alike, will be most susceptible to its negative effects; and those in positions of wealth and power will be the first to benefit from transitions in the economy. Climate change impacts and solutions […] encompass a wide diversity of experiences due to country, age, ethnicity, race, class, and in particular, gender” and our varied experiences with connection to land and earth.
Unions need to urgently prioritise climate justice work, requiring no less than an organisational transformation to comprehensively deal with this challenge. There are many ways that unions can act to combat climate change. These materials will introduce and discuss the following 3 areas of intervention:
Climate justice is a term that frames climate change as a social justice issue, rather than seeing the climate crisis from a purely science perspective. Climate justice addresses a mass movement with people organising, lobbying, and mobilising for change in our local communities and around the world. Climate justice also addresses the need to make sure that, as we face up to the climate crisis, we do so in a way in which we do not further increase inequalities and injustice. Communities and countries that are most negatively impacted by climate change are least resourced to adapt to those impacts.
The term ‘just transition’ originated with the trade unions and is increasingly becoming a common part of trade union vocabulary. At its heart, it is a vision of an inclusive society, a low-carbon economy with green and unionised jobs and a strategy to make trade unions and workers key actors in economic and political decision-making (social dialogue). A just transition calls for the protection of workers’ rights during the transition to a more sustainable world.
There is a real danger that governments, employers, and trade unions will go on record as saying that a just transition to a low carbon economy is needed, but fail to take the level of action required to ensure it happens. There is no guarantee that the transition to a low carbon economy will take place, and even if it does happen, it may be implemented at the expense of workers and communities.
Unions have a strong tradition of both pushing government policy to address grave social problems and mobilising and organising mass movements and campaigns. In the interest of the survival of the planet, unions and workers must be a driving force for climate justice. As the ITF, the global federation of transport unions, puts it: “There will be no concerted global action soon on climate from the top. We will have to build a mass movement from the grass roots to force the leaders of the world to act. Almost all policy makers and almost all the media accept the arguments for austerity. Unions do not. Unions want massive government spending to create decent jobs that do not destroy the planet.”
Addressing issues that affect all workers and the safety and survival of our families and communities can strengthen worker involvement in the union and increase associational power.
Societal power is increased with the union’s expanded stature and alliances with the public and other climate justice movements.
Winning agreements to reduce carbon use, improve the environmental dimension of the workplace and to achieve a just transition increase workers’ and unions’ institutional power.
The upcoming changes to resource use and transformation of economic sectors and workplaces will affect workers’ structural power. The union’s task is to negotiate just transition policies, in which reskilling and upskilling the labour force is of high priority in negotiating good working conditions in new sectors and providing jobs for workers whose sector will be negatively affected.
Workplaces must be at the heart of union climate justice work. The materials in this section cover:
How are workers in your workplace impacted by the climate crisis?
What has been done or not done to address these issues?
How can the response to the climate crisis be expanded and improved at your workplace?
How can workers learn more about and keep up to date with information about the climate crisis?
Worker interviews and surveys collect and share information about workers’ environmental concerns and build ownership of climate justice work. Involving workers through one-to-one surveys and contacts can best position the union to take action on climate justice.
The survey can include questions about how the employer can implement carbon reductions, prepare for the impacts of the climate crisis, and ask for suggestions on how to prevent or mitigate job loss.
The union Unite in the UK organised at the shop floor level in a large-scale brewery. The union first gathered ideas for energy savings from workers in each department and took these suggestions forward to a committee. In two years, the brewery was able to reduce the site’s carbon footprint by 40% and save more than 2 million pounds.
Review the Tool Box materials on Participatory Action Research if you have not already done so.
How could worker interviews or surveys be useful in your workplace?
What workers will you be interviewing? Who would do the interviewing?
What questions would you ask?
Workers are directly impacted by issues such as emissions, air quality, heat and other environmental concerns in the course of their work. In some countries and regions there are specific environmental workplace representatives or committees (sometimes known as “green union representatives” or “green champions”). In other countries, the health and safety committees and representatives address issues of climate justice. In either case, the goal is to ensure that the union at the workplace is fully involved in setting environmental agenda, policies and practices.
In the Flanders region of Belgium, union safety reps have the legal right to be informed and act on environmental issues. They are entitled to bring in union officers to support consultations with the employer on environmental performance.
Unions in the United Kingdom are campaigning for rights for time off for workplace environmental reps or “green reps” to work on issues of climate justice.
The following is some draft contract language regarding green representatives from the UK Trade Union Congress.
“The (employer) recognises that green union representatives play a key role in encouraging worker engagement in energy and environmental initiatives, and so help develop good practice in energy and resource use at the (employer). Union green representatives will be allocated reasonable facilities time (not less than x days per month or x% of their working time) to carry out their duties in relation to environmental issues, including attending meetings with the employer and/or the union, consulting with workers, attending training, preparing paperwork and materials.”
Working close to aircraft engines can expose aviation workers to ultra-fine air pollution with serious potential consequences for workers health, including cancer.
At Copenhagen Airport, the union, 3F United Federation of Danish Workers, formed a labor management working group on the issue. The union hired an air pollution specialist to assist the union and the working group released a research report to the public.
As a result, action was taken by the airport to invest in electrical engines and filters for equipment, to avoid and shorten idle times and to create additional rules for aircraft taxing to/from take-off. The working group continues to work on further research and action steps and is urging all airports and international airport organisations to take action to improve air quality and the work environment.
What would an ideal system of workplace representatives and committees on environmental issues look like in your workplace/union?
What steps are necessary to implement or improve such a system?
An audit of the workplace, the company, or the union itself, should include initial and regular benchmarks for emission reductions. According to the Trade Union Congress in the United Kingdom, “Workplaces burn energy, consume resources and generate waste and travel so they are an obvious place to tackle climate change … Over half of carbon emissions in the UK are work-related.”
An environmental audit can include a review of current emissions, existing environmental policies, energy conservation of heating and lighting, waste management, purchasing and use policies for equipment and systems, the prevention and removal of toxins and pollution, and for mitigating and adapting to negative climate change impacts.
To measure and set goals for emission reductions, you need to know or review the employer’s or union’s current emissions footprint. An emissions footprint is the total emissions which an individual or organisation is responsible for. This may include heating, energy, hot water, and electricity use, including from transport and suppliers. The emissions footprint will enable you to compare the employer to other companies, set targets, benchmarks, and best practices.
If your employer has not already calculated their footprint, you will need readings on usage from the employer’s utility bills, modes of transport and vehicle fuel usage, information on emissions from agricultural and industrial processes, and CO2 use from significant suppliers of products and materials.
The following questions developed by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) can help you initiate the discussion with an employer or union about emission reduction.
Once you have the baseline audits and policy reviews completed, work through a labour-management structure to create an action plan that includes clear targets and benchmarks, dates for completion and a system for monitoring. If there are no functioning labour-management structures, plan how you can pressure the employer to take action.
In the UK, the union at the National Health Service (NHS), UNISON, has been working with a hospital wide labour-management negotiating body to reduce emissions.
A worker survey led to a union led green fair and training sessions for workers. According to the union: “The NHS creates one million tons of carbon emissions every year. If the NHS shaved 15% off its energy consumption, it would save 50 million pounds per year on its energy bills.”
Does your employer have a plan to mitigate negative impacts of the climate crisis?
Does your employer have an emissions reduction plan? If so, what can be done to improve it?
What does a workplace audit of your employer or union need to include?
Climate justice issues need to be included in collective bargaining agreements where they are regularly negotiated and enforceable by the parties.
Negotiating a collective climate crisis agreement (either as a result of written policy from a joint employer-union committee, a standalone negotiated agreement, or within an existing collective bargaining agreement) can secure employer commitment (at the sectoral, workplace or company level) to targets and actions that can be enforced and ensure that the plans include what workers want and need.
Union negotiated contract language can cover topics such as just transition, green representatives, greenhouse gas reduction, workers’ rights and responsibilities during times of climate disasters and other topics of concern to workers.
Contract language could look something like the sample below from the UK Trade Union Congress (TUC):
The parties to this agreement are committed to developing a shared approach to addressing energy and environmental issues through this agreement. The (employer) commits to complying at all times to relevant environmental legislation and will work to improve the wider environmental agenda with the use of best practice and examples. With this in mind, the (employer) commits to:
As part of this ongoing work and commitment, the (employer) and the (union) will support the creation of a Joint Climate Justice Task Force to engage in constructive dialogue between the employer and the union. The parties agree to ensure that all departments/work areas are represented on the Task Force and that the members of the task force are provided with all relevant information concerning the environmental issues within the workplace. The Task Force will be made of the following representatives (identify and describe). The Task Force will meet (times a month or year) and will annually vote on a chair and secretary, to be alternated between the employer side and the union side.
The Task Force will address the following areas of work (include appropriate areas of work and detail for each): environmental audits, emissions reduction, energy and water use, recycling, resource use, air quality and temperature, purchasing, job loss prevention, time off and education of green reps, and transport.
SENTRO, a national trade union federation in the Philippines, has worked with their affiliates to negotiate just transition language in their collective bargaining agreements. The collective agreement with Siemens Electric Power includes language on climate change and a commitment to build an industry roadmap for decarbonisation.
Many of the collective agreements concluded by unions affiliated to the National Congress of Unions in the Sugar Industry in the Philippines (NACUSIP) include measures that address climate change.
The parties have agreed to the regular conduct of power shutdown for one hour during noontime (earth hour) to reduce manufacturing emissions, proper waste management and disposal, and tree planting and coastal cleaning. Green jobs are generated for workers assigned to waste management.
The unions’ awareness and capability in including these measures in negotiations with management were the result of union leaders’ participation in climate change and climate resilience training activities provided by the International Labour Organization (ILO).
What topics would benefit from collectively negotiated language?
□ Reduction of emissions
□ Training and education on climate justice
□ Joint employer task force or committees
□ Environmental audits
□ Energy, water, and resource use
□ Recycling
□ Air quality
□ Purchasing
□ Transport
□ Just transition
□ Time off and education of workplace green representatives
□ Mitigation and adaption to climate change disasters
□ Other?
What would be the advantage of negotiating these items into a collective bargaining agreement?
Will you negotiate these items into an existing collective agreement or as a stand-alone document?
How can you begin building worker support for climate change negotiating demands and priorities?
This section will cover the following topics:
A union task force or workplace committee can be the key driver/ agency to transform the union to prioritise climate justice. To what extent such a transformation can be pursued depends on the mandate the task force or committee receives from the union decision-making structures. The scope of such a mandate can range from preparing internal changes by educating workers or developing new union policies, strategic action plans and negotiating agendas, to external actions such as developing organising campaigns, building alliances and preparing public policy interventions.
Once you have the authority and mandate from the union to move forward, recruit leaders and workers to the task force and decide on the process to turn your climate justice mandate into reality.
The union task force can educate workers about the climate crisis, through one-to-one conversations, group discussions and with written information and social media campaigns. Mobilising workers to attend climate justice actions organised by the union and allies can help build commitment and understanding.
Is climate justice already part of the work of the union or the employer? Where and how?
Who are the other workers and leaders with an interest in climate justice?
What information and resources on climate justice does the union or employer have available for workers? What more is needed?
How can the scope of the task force be defined?
What resources would a task force need to fulfil its mandate?
In the process of transitioning to a low-carbon economy and development pathway, new sectors and companies will emerge. Unions need to organise these workplaces and industries to ensure that there will be decent work in climate and green jobs.
If you are ready to pressure an employer or decision-maker on an issue about the climate crisis or organise a group of new climate or green job workers, theTool Box section on “Campaigning and Organising” will be useful.
In Argentina, 300 waste collectors organised with the Federation of Waste Pickers of Argentina. They successfully pressured the local government to provide a work location, arguing the importance of better policies for public recycling. They won access to a local warehouse, where they can now gather and sort materials.
In California, a new state government policy was introduced requiring utility companies to purchase at least 50% of their electricity from renewable sources by 2050. Unions developed strategic partnerships with environmental groups, local and state governments, established their own solar training course and ensured that construction jobs were decent and secure union jobs. In sum total, the solar-farm construction boom between 2009 and 2014 created over 15,000 new jobs.
“The German trade union IG Metall carried out a wide-scale organising campaign from 2009 to 2014 targeting the most relevant companies in the renewable energy sector, with a specific focus on the wind and solar industries. The campaign was divided into several waves and included the following:
The results exceeded expectations. The first wave of the campaign led to the establishment of IG Metall as the union in the sector. The campaign created 20 new works councils, elected 150 shop stewards for the first time in the industry, signed several collective bargaining agreements as well as the 1500 new members recruited. Trade union membership developed in several companies in the sector which were previously closed to trade unions, such as at the wind energy leader Enercon.
What organising campaigns will help address climate change?
What climate justice policies can create climate jobs in your sector or country?
How can you ensure that the climate jobs will be decent and secure union jobs?
What climate jobs and industries in your area need to be unionised?
We need a mass movement of working people for climate justice. Unions in many countries have formed alliances with other social justice and environmental organisations to push for government and employer action on climate justice.
Sometimes actions will be led by unions and sometimes actions will be led by Indigenous Peoples, environmental groups, women, racially oppressed peoples, youth and other allies.
The Builders Laborers Federation in New South Wales, Australia in the 1970s worked for and believed in the social responsibility of labour and that building and construction workers should have a right to have a say in what was built.
The NSW BLF internationally famous “green bans” stopped construction work and saved bushland, green spaces, and affordable housing in working class and aboriginal communities. The movement spread to 54 “green bans” holding up over $ 5 billion in construction in Sydney. Many of the green bans resulted in occupations, picket lines, arrests, jailings, and violent threats against union leaders. The union required every green ban to be voted on by the BLF workers assembly and to be supported by community activism. The first “pink ban” occurred when the labourers union refused to build at Macquarie University in solidarity with the dismissal of a gay academic.
In a 1978 letter to the Sydney Herald, Jack Mundy, president of the NSW BLF wrote that, “our members want to build, yet we prefer to construct hospitals, schools, and other public utilities and high-quality housing … rather than … blocks of offices … Though we want all our members employed, we will not just become robots directed by developer-builders who value the dollar at the expense of the environment … More and more, we are going to determine which buildings we will build … Progressive unions, like ours, therefore have a very useful social role to play in the citizens’ interest, and we intend to play it.”
Burgmann, Meredith. 1998. Green Bans, Red Union: Environmental Activism and the New South Wales Builders Labourers' Federation
What social justice organisations and groups are working on climate justice in your area?
What is the missing conversation in the climate justice debate, especially from a worker perspective?
What steps can the union take to strengthen relationships with allies working on climate justice?
What kind of alliances are needed to address the climate crisis?
Youth are leading and mobilising the largest protests and strikes against climate change in history. Unions can follow the collective mobilisation structures of youth climate activists and help remove barriers to youth leadership. Young workers need to sit at the negotiating table and unions need to fully integrate young workers in all our climate justice work.
During the 2019 global climate strike, the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) and unions around the world stood with students. “The solidarity of the trade union movement globally is behind you,” Sharon Burrows, the president of the ITUC explained that “[t]he ITUC, with over 200 million members around the world, is totally in support of your leadership.”
What youth led movements for climate justice are in your communities and union(s)?
What steps can the union take to engage with and support these movements?
How can young people in your unions get more involved in climate action?
Women are disproportionally impacted by the climate crisis and are underrepresented in decision-making in connection with the climate crisis. Climate change is increasing gender inequality.
How are women in your union and communities organising for climate justice?
What can the union do to address the climate change impacts women are facing?
How can the union support women organising for climate justice?
For centuries and longer, Indigenous Peoples and communities have been leading resistance movements locally and internationally to protect the earth and ecological resources. The United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People recognises that Indigenous People have specific knowledge, traditional practices, and cultural customs that contribute to the proper and sustainable management of earth’s resources.
An estimated 370 million Indigenous Peoples hold stewardship of 20% of the earth’s land mass. In 2019, the International Indigenous Peoples’ Forum (ILLPF) outlined the need for commitments on climate change – to secure Indigenous Peoples’ rights to lands, territories, self-determination, sovereignty and resources, the protection of the earth and biocultural diversity, and the development of renewable resources around the world.
What Indigenous Peoples are working on climate justice, land rights and stewardship in your communities and around the globe?
What steps can the union take to support Indigenous Peoples' movements?
How can alliances/partnerships between trade unions and Indigenous Peoples' movements be initiated and/or strengthened?
Education about the climate crisis can be challenging. Average working people have been blamed for not doing more about the climate crisis and left with the impression that the only way to stop climate change is through a massive worsening of conditions. Or that the climate crisis is too complicated and scientific of an issue to understand. There are both hidden and blatant messages about how only privileged wealthy people in rich countries should care about the climate crisis. These messages can lead to hopelessness and apathy.
To educate and organise workers, we need to start with where people are, address assumptions, engage people with discussions about solutions that they can be involved in, and move people to action. There are a number of resources for educating and involving union members in climate justice work that you can adapt to your own needs.
The Global Labour University has a free online course called “Just and Green: Labour’s Ecological Question.” The course includes materials on why the environment is a labour issues, as well as information on labour struggles from various sectors, labour debates and policy proposals. https://global-labour-university.org/index.php?id=472
The ITF (International Transport Workers Federation) has produced a series of fact sheets that are designed to be used as a workshop or a series of 1.5 hour educational sessions. The topics begin with Factsheet #1 The Basics – Carbon Dioxide and include topics such as “Controversies – Carbon Taxes” and “Controversies – Global North and South”. The notes for trainers can be found in Factsheet #24 Notes for Trainers. (link) https://www.itfglobal.org/en/training-education/climate-justice-factsheets
The Greener Jobs Alliance has an online course titled “A Trade Union Guide to Just Transition”. The course is divided into four modules, explaining the climate crisis, depicting how trade unions are working on international agreements to tackle the climate crisis, looking at union demands for a fair and just transition and proposing how to get involved in your union, your workplace, and your community. (link) https://www.greenerjobsalliance.co.uk/
PSI (Public Services International) has a workbook called “Confronting the Climate Crisis: Time to Act”, which contains an overview of climate justice issues and a series of workshop activities on the climate crisis. (link) https://publicservices.international/resources/page/climate-change?id=9556&lang=en
How will the union communicate and educate union members about climate justice?
What would climate justice trade union education look like in your union? Would one-to-one conversations, union education sessions, study circles, a climate justice fair or exhibition, or a workshop best fit your situation?
What climate justice resource materials will you use?
What steps will the union take to strengthen climate justice education?
A strategic plan will identify in a participatory process the key objectives and action that the union will undertake to fight for climate justice. Ensure a mandate from the union organisational structures and leadership, form a core committee or task force to drive the process, and move forward to create a strategic plan.
The Tool Box materials on “Strategic Planning” can assist you.
You may want a process that involves the employer in climate justice and ensuring a just transition, such as a joint labour-management task force, a labour-management negotiating body or the expansion of an existing structure such as a health and safety committee to include climate justice.
A strategic plan on confronting the climate crisis is an opportunity for the union to build alliances with key stakeholders in the movements of young workers, women and Indigenous Peoples on the climate crisis, and to increase the participation of workers from these groups and others that are concerned about the climate crisis.
How will the union benefit from a climate justice strategic plan? What will the focus of the strategic plan be?
How will the strategic plan for climate justice align with the broader strategic plan for the union?
Will you involve the employer in a joint effort and, if so, how will this be structured?
How will the strategic plan support the movements of Indigenous Peoples, youth, racially oppressed peoples, and women organising for climate justice?
The climate crisis is present, and the impacts are already severe, particularly for workers in low and middle-income countries. Global inequalities are increasing due to neoliberalism, centuries of colonialist histories and the climate crisis itself. Workers and unions in countries that are highly vulnerable to the impacts of the climate crisis and are among the least resourced to respond to its impacts.
Funding and the expansion of the public sphere are critical to confronting the climate crisis and the global community has done too little to address these needs. Unions must fight for increased public resource allocations to cope with the impacts of the climate crisis, locally, nationally, and globally.
The ITUC points out that climate justice “actions must be fairly shared and distributed between and within countries; responsibility and capacity must be the guiding principles for burden sharing … Every country has a role to play in addressing climate change. Developed countries must take the lead on emission reductions and provide sufficient funding for adaptation … Developing countries can change the nature of their growth … with funding and technology to undertake those measures.”
The ITUC is working to establish financial structures to support adequate just transition policies at the global level.
Climate migration and conflict situations will increase massively as the climate crisis continues to impact the world. Unions have a strong role to play in assisting arriving climate refugees and ensuring we are prepared, and that public globally resourced emergency response plans exist.
Agricultural sectors are heavily impacted globally by the climate crisis. Small-holder farms need protection along with the storage and protection of fresh water supplies, expanded irrigation systems, forestation, drought-tolerant seeds, improved weather forecasting, early warning and evacuation preparation.
Health-care systems need improvement and public rather than private profit-driven control of healthcare is needed. According to the World Health Organisation, “Climate change may indirectly affect the COVID-19 response, as it undermines environmental determinants of health, and places additional stress on health systems. More generally, most emerging infectious diseases, and almost all recent pandemics, originate in wildlife, and there is evidence that increasing human pressure on the natural environment may drive disease emergence. Strengthening health systems, improved surveillance of infectious disease in wildlife, livestock and humans, and greater protection of biodiversity and the natural environment, should reduce the risks of future outbreaks of other new diseases.”
The global union federation for public sector unions, PSI, issued the following statement in 2017: “More and more, unions recognise that the solutions to better climate disaster response are to be found in the political sphere, requiring that unions develop political strategies to develop public policies to improve disaster prevention, response and reconstruction. These public policies and programmes are required not only to protect emergency workers, but ultimately to protect families and entire communities.”
When a flood, a famine, or a storm destroys a city or location, unions can assist with emergency support and communications and a message connecting the disaster to the experiences of other communities around the world which are also being impacted by the climate crisis. Unions need to help ensure that disaster prevention, pandemic responses and rebuild plans are driven by workers in decent and secure union jobs.
When climate disasters strike, the authorities and the news media will move quickly to set an agenda and a message. During disaster relief, capital and goods and wealthy communities are often prioritised over the lives of working people. Unions representing emergency workers on the ground can act as a microphone for communities facing disasters, demanding increased resources, and helping shame governments into acting.
SEWA, the Self-Employed Women’s Association of India, responded immediately to Covid19, organising food distribution, cash transfers, health education, the distribution of health kits and advocacy work for its members. However, much more has been needed from the authorities, including income support to informal workers, organised food distribution and loan relief and debt forgiveness.
Check the Global Adaptation Index to see your countries vulnerability to climate change. https://gain.nd.edu/our-work/country-index/
What more can be done to prepare your union and your country to respond to negative impacts of climate change, including climate disasters and migration? What resources are needed?
How can the union push for an increased public sector effort and increased public resources for climate justice locally, nationally and globally?
As we move to a more sustainable economy, the impacts on workers is tremendous and leadership from unions is critical. The 2015 Paris Agreement defines a just transition as one that “[t]akes into account the imperatives of a just transition of the workforce and the creation of decent work and quality jobs in accordance with nationally defined development priorities.”
The ITUC defines Just Transition as requiring “an economy-wide process that produces the plans, policies and investments that lead to a sustainable future with full employment, decent work and social protection. An effective Just Transition process requires social dialogue between governments, employers, and unions to develop the measures that build trust and guarantee secure income support for affected workers, skills training and redeployment services.”
Trade unions around the world have various positions regarding the way in which to achieve climate goals. And how much the way our economies are run need to be to transformed, for example, by the level of state intervention and control and by the level of democratising (energy production). Sectoral transitions play a key role, and the energy sector is at the forefront of the debate.
Over 80% of the world’s energy is produced by burning coal, oil, and gas. Fossil fuels release billions of tonnes of carbon dioxide and are the biggest driver of the climate crisis. In a just transition, anyone who loses their job because we stop burning oil, coal or gas must be guaranteed re-employment or a grant ensuring that they are no worse off than before. Where there is a dependence on carbon-intensive jobs, a just transition requires public investments in publicly owned localised energy production and the requalification and redeployment of workers from declining sectors to growing sectors. In the process, workers need to be guaranteed social protection and access to find new decent work opportunities.
The Ruhr region in Germany has managed to progressively transform its economy from a coal and steel stronghold to a much more diversified economy specialising in environmental technologies and research. Social dialogue played a strong role in the policy process and included the following key elements:
In 1993, social partners in the mining sector designed a workers’ relocation program, an early retirement scheme and extensive vocational training.
The Spanish trade unions (CCOO and UGT), government and business organisations have established a platform for tripartite social dialogue on climate change to prevent, avoid or reduce the potentially adverse effects that could result from compliance with the Kyoto Protocol, in particular those related to competitiveness and employment.
Other sectors’ transformation such as transport or agriculture are likewise challenged when it comes to being guided by a just transition perspective.
The city of Nairobi is introducing a climate-friendly public bus rapid transit (BRT) system. Nairobi currently has one of the highest levels of cancer-causing air pollution in the world.
The unions have determined that the new BRT system may directly generate 5-6,000 new potentially decent jobs, while approximately 35,000 livelihoods in the informal passenger transport sector could be at risk.
The Public Transport Operators Union (PUTON), the Matatu Workers Union (MWU) and the Transport and Allied Workers Union (TAWU) are organising workers to demand that the new system be affordable and for the benefit of all, rather than for the profits of a few. The unions are campaigning for decent pay and conditions for all transport workers in Nairobi, respect for their rights, access to training, a fair opportunity to apply for the new jobs and an end to corruption and harassment from authorities, a collective bargaining and consultative process with the authorities, and a just transition for workers facing job loss.
It is important to be clear about what is meant by ‘just transition’. A 2019 report from the Transnational Institute states that “[s]ome governments and corporations are now advancing visions of just transition that pay lip service to the concept, while allowing them to continue to profit from initiatives that social movements around the world have branded as ‘false solutions. From cap-and-trade systems to carbon capture and geoengineering, to the promotion of massive, monocultural agrofuel plantations, a number of deeply problematic ‘solutions’ to the climate crisis are on the table.”
“These false solutions are often informed by a narrow vision of ‘net-zero’ (achieved through carbon trading) or marginally reduced emissions, with little regard for broader environmental, social, and economic problems, or for human rights. Many of these proposals will deepen inequality; dispossess marginalised people of land and resources; diminish democratic control over resources; privatise commons, public goods and services; further the exploitation of workers; and preserve the most damaging aspects of our current economic system. This is in sharp contrast to understandings of just transition driven by peoples’ movements, which see environmental harms as just one critical manifestation of a broader crisis.”
Why is just transition a priority for your union?
What does a just transition look like for your union? Your sector? Your country?
Which sectors could be pursued to best showcase a just transition in your country?
What actions can the union take to support a just transition?
Unions are campaigning for large-scale government investment in new climate jobs that will cut emissions. Climate jobs are jobs that reduce the amount of greenhouse gases. This is different from ‘green jobs’, which can include a variety of jobs that may or may not reduce emissions.
The climate jobs campaigns want new jobs now. They are not asking governments to promise to ‘create’ jobs by 2030 or encourage industry to do so. They want the government to start hiring people immediately for decent secure climate jobs. In countries where carbon-intensive industries are not well established, the issue is not conversion to climate neutral jobs, but rather the creation of climate-neutral jobs.
Governments can afford climate jobs. Investments in climate jobs create a far greater number of jobs than equal investments in the natural gas and coal industries. Money spent on jobs get the economy moving again, as workers spend money on food, housing and other goods. Money is returned to governments when workers start paying taxes and stop claiming social benefits. Money is also returned when people pay for the things that are produced by climate job workers, whether it be bus tickets or electricity. Many governments have access to reserve funds and can also raise money through taxes on the wealthy and financial transactions. For example, in 2008, the US government found $ 400 billion within a week when they bailed out US banks.
“In Africa, you not only have the unequal distribution of land originating from the colonial era, but the increasing negative impact of climate change on agricultural productivity, which is driving greater numbers of Africans into urban areas. However, there are hardly any prospects for a decent income there … Cities around the world are already responsible for more than 70 per cent of all CO2 emissions – and, in the future, over a billion people are expected to live in African cities. Much of the necessary urban infrastructure in Africa has not yet been built. It is unclear how, by whom, under what conditions, for whom, and with what kind of energy supply this infrastructure should be built. There is great potential here for African countries to actively shape this future, but also an immediate need for international and national policy to focus more on African cities.”
Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung Kenya Office, 2020,Towards the Just City in Kenya. Available at:
Farmers, rural workers, and those whose livelihoods are destroyed by extractivism, disasters or the long-term effects of climate change must have the means to make a decent living. The “One Million Climate Jobs” alliance of unions and social movements in South Africa has concluded that: 1) Rural people who lose their livelihoods because of climate change need climate subsidies 2) Small farmers need an enormous amount of help to cope with the new climate 3) Small farmers, semi-subsistence farmers and farm workers will need much more good land to cope. That means land reform, which includes access to water. 4) Rural areas and rural people will need many of the new climate jobs.
In Bangladesh over 4 million solar home systems have been installed, creating 115,000 jobs and increasing per capita income 9-12%.
In India the waste sector is expected to grow by 5% per year as India’s urban population grows. SEWA, the Self-Employed Women’s Association, is working to secure political and legislative protection for waste pickers, including a national policy to improve working conditions and incorporate waste pickers and their organisations into urban waste management systems.
In Brasil, new legislation in 2010 now provides for the formal recognition of at least 75 percent of waste pickers in the country along with a requirement that 45 percent of solid waste be recycled by 2031.
What sectors could be pursued for climate jobs in your country?
If relevant to your situation, review the South African proposal for 1 million climate jobs https://energy-democracy.net/one-million-climate-jobs-campaign/ or the New York state proposal for climate jobs, https://digitalcommons.ilr.cornell.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1064&context=reports
or an example from the global network of unions fighting for climate jobs. https://globalclimatejobs.wordpress.com/
What is the proposal for climate jobs in your country? If there is not one, what might a climate jobs proposal look like for your country?
What actions can the union take to support the proposal for climate jobs?
Trade union action on climate justice can be particularly important at the sectoral level. Workers and unions have a profound knowledge of their industrial sectors. They are thus well-placed to devise plans or are involved in a social dialogue on how to transform production and products to be more climate-friendly and produce better outcomes for workers and communities.
Sectoral transformation plans can set emission targets for a particular sector in a country or region. These should specify the way to achieve goals and targets, including industrial policy measures, public and private investments, pathways for adapting new technologies, re-skilling and social protection policies for workers and affected communities.
In 2020, Spanish unions signed a just transition agreement with the government and with the operators of coal-fired power stations that were in the process of being closed. The agreement includes specific investment plans for each affected geographic region. A monitoring committee will meet every six months to ensure compliance. According to Pedro Hojas, general secretary of UGT-FICA: “All levels of administration, both the government, the autonomous communities and town halls, have committed to work together and provide the necessary economic resources so that no one is left without a job.”
The International Transport Workers Federation has developed a “People’s Public Transport Policy calling for “ambitious public transport commitments by national governments, including the allocation of sufficient public resources to invest in and develop high-quality, modern, public transport systems. High-quality public transport investments could create millions of direct jobs while also reducing emissions … There is an urgent need for greater democratic involvement at the level of public ownership and management in order to ‘guarantee’ the delivery of the economic, social, environmental and employment benefits of public transport for all.”
The policy speaks specifically about informal work in the public transport sector, demanding “the integration of decent work as a central objective of sustainable public transport … the regulation of employment in informal public transport … the involvement of informal workers in the formalisation of public transport and the strengthening of women’ employment and the promotion of decent work in public transport.”
Sam Huggard, General Secretary of the New Council of Trade Unions has successfully campaigned for the New Zealand government to commit to a just transition policy for the country’s oil and gas industry. He emphasises that “workers, delegates and shop stewards should drive the debate about just transition. If just transition is just negotiated by the top in our capitals with business leaders and policy elites, then it is meaningless and it means nothing to workers on the ground. If workers drive the debate, it not only gives a voice to working people, we will also develop a leadership cadre of workers who can support their colleagues through the transition.”
Trade Unions for Energy Democracy propose that for the energy sector “A transfer of resources, capital and infrastructure from private hands to a democratically controlled public sector will need to occur in order to ensure that a truly sustainable energy system is developed in the decades ahead.”
The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) and the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA) have taken a position supporting both clean energy and economy-wide decarbonization. However, this must happen with a “shift towards a long overdue ‘public goods’ approach to energy transition” not the current neoliberal formula being promoted by the World Bank and others that pushes privatization, “undermining public energy and promoting private sector interests.”
In 2020, the unions participated, along with Trade Unions for Energy Democracy (TUED) and others, in an FES-supported research report entitled “Eskom Transformed: Achieving a Just Energy Transition for South Africa”, outlining the steps necessary to achieve socially owned renewable energy in the country.
In 2018, the Philippine government launched its Public Utility Vehicle Modernization Program, or the jeepney modernization program, which aims to bring down harmful vehicular emissions in the Philippines by phasing out units with outdated engines. While the iconic jeepneys running on diesel are not the only sources of air pollution in the Philippines, recent studies show that they do contribute a lot.
However, the cost of the modern jeepneys is huge for an ordinary jeepney driver or operator. A new electric jeepney unit costs between USD 39,500-49,500, an amount that, even with bank loans, is simply unattainable for drivers and operators. Thus, while the National Confederation of Transport Workers Union (NCTU), which is affiliated with SENTRO, clearly understands the program’s urgency and significance, it opposes the idea of a jeepney phase-out without just transition.
With the outbreak of COVID-19 and the lockdown measures imposed beginning in mid-March 2020, the number of public utility vehicles allowed to transport passengers was significantly reduced.
In June 2020, the Move as One Coalition, a coalition of 134 organisations, including NCTU-SENTRO, proposed to the Philippine government to contract out transportation services of public utility vehicles (PUVs) nationwide to avoid a public transportation crisis and to protect the country’s public transport workers in the time of the pandemic. Under the proposed service contracting program, which also involves the use of modern electric jeepneys, the government pays operators and drivers a per-kilometer fee to run the routes assigned to them, so the income of transport workers is independent of the number of passengers they have. Thus, the program effectively guarantees the job security of 2.7 million land transport workers while also ensuring the safety of 8 million commuters in Metro Manila.
In early 2021, the Department of Transportation adopted the service contracting program proposed by the Move as One Coalition, albeit on a limited scale. The Coalition continues to dialogue with the government authorities to expand the program.
What specific policies and legislation relating to climate justice impact your sector?
What gaps exist and what additional policies and legislation need to be added?
What steps can the union take to initiate, support and campaign for climate justice policies in your industry or sector?
What experiences do affiliates of your Global Union Federation have with sectoral transformation and the role of unions therein?
The ILO recommends the consultation and the involvement of trade unions in the planning and implementation of low-carbon policies at “all possible levels and stages”. In reality, unions are often not included and have to push for a social dialogue.
The 2015 Paris Agreement created a system where countries have to periodically submit national reports known as Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) that are reviewed at the global level every five years. NDCs for each country that has submitted them can be found at NDC registry. Updates to NDCs are performed regularly, with a review process slated for after 2023. Unions need to prepare ahead, examine implementation pathways and push for improved NDC commitments including regarding labour rights, poverty reduction, equality, and a just transition. To date, most NDCs mention just transition only marginally, if at all.
Unions may have work to do to engage more fully in lobbying and policy work on climate justice. An ETUC survey found that 61% of their member unions do not have “sufficient ability to properly participate in discussions linked to decarbonisation strategies. When asked about the main barriers to the union’s involvement in the discussions, the lack of priority given to green transition issues was the most frequent answer given.” https://www.etuc.org/en/publication/involving-trade-unions-climate-action-build-just-transition-guide-video#.WvqRZ4iFM2w
The Nigerian Labor Congress (NLC) has been engaging in climate change research, education and training for over five years.
In 2019, the Nigerian government asked the NLC to help “…develop a national roadmap outlining action plans to domesticate the SilesiaDeclaration to chart a new carbon economy and build workers’ perspective on the implementation of the NDC and related domestic policy instruments”.
The New Zealand Council of Trade Unions has a number of resources and reports from their successful campaign for a national just transition policy. The materials include the report “Just Transition: A Working People’s Response to Climate Change” and an interactive worker survey and fact sheet. The following is an excerpt from a survey of workers that the unions used to pressure the national government.
Review your government’s NDC submission if it has been submitted. https://www4.unfccc.int/sites/ndcstaging/Pages/Home.aspx
Review the ITUC scorecard, which compares national NDCs according to issues such as the commitment to just transition and social dialogue. https://www4.unfccc.int/sites/ndcstaging/Pages/Home.aspx
Identify the strengths and weaknesses of your government’s NDC or national climate justice policies.
What would you like to see included in your government’s NDC and national policies?
How else might you push your national government to improve their climate change policies?
How can you involve workers in a campaign and actions to improve national climate policy?
The International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) serves as the global voice of workers and unions and has prioritised global action on climate justice and just transition.
The ITUC coordinates the work of the trade union movement’s input to major environmental intergovernmental processes, including the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). https://www.ituc-csi.org/just-transition-centre
The UNFCC hosts conferences on the climate crisis that set out global commitments, including the 2015 Paris Climate Change Agreement, which was signed by 195 countries in 1995. Unions and allies have worked hard to make their voices heard at the global level and to force their governments to move more forcefully on climate justice issues. Thanks to this mobilisation, the Paris Agreement recognised the need to create decent jobs and guarantee a just transition for workers as we shift to a low carbon society.
COP stands for the conference of the parties under the UNFCCC. COPs are held annually and are an opportunity for trade unions and civil society organisations to engage at the global level in UN processes as well as build relationships, encourage mobilisation, and coordinate campaign strategies. At COP24, the Silesia Declaration was launched, encouraging countries to incorporate just transition into their national plans under the Paris Agreement.
The global federation of public service unions (PSI) warns that “[a]fter a quarter of a century, there has been little in the way of ambitious and binding targets at the global level. While there have been gains made, it is clear that without mobilization and action from trade unions and civil society, governments will continue to be heavily influenced by corporate interests, including the fossil fuel giants. The role of trade unions in ensuring a just green transition and ambitious carbon reductions is vital.”
Trade Unions for Energy Democracy is a global organisation of trade unions committed specifically to democratic control of energy and solutions on the climate crisis and energy poverty. http://unionsforenergydemocracy.org/about/about-the-initiative/
The global union federations (GUFs) provide a platform for sectoral and industrial climate justice issues to be heard at a global level as the federations are organised globally by sector. Each of the GUFs will have global climate justice resources available for their sector and industries.
For example, IndustriALL, the global umbrella union of mining, energy and manufacturing unions, organised an international meeting of coal mining unions in 2018 to work towards just transitions and defend coal miners’ interests in the face of the climate crisis. The meeting was held in Delhi, with participation of unions from Australia, Botswana, Bulgaria, Georgia, India, Indonesia, Mongolia, Spain, South Africa, Turkey, Ukraine, and Vietnam.
Unions are involved in coalitions and alliances at the national and local levels which are organising globally. National and local governments need to be leaned on to create stronger global action to deal with the climate crisis and unions are key to this process.
How is the union involved in global climate change campaigns at the global level?
What else needs to be done?