Unions seek abolition of strike bans

In early 2004, Bulgarian trade unions are continuing their long-running campaign to abolish legislative provisions which prohibit workers in power supply, healthcare, communications and postal services from taking strike action.

The new Bulgarian Constitution, adopted in 1991, established the right of 'workers and employees' to strike in defence of their collective economic and social interests. A special law on the settlement of collective labour disputes had been adopted in 1990, regulating issues such as the requirements and procedures for exercising the right to strike. After the adoption of the Constitution, this law was amended, based on the new constitutional provisions. Parliament introduced a restriction whereby workers in certain branches and activities were prohibited from announcing and holding strikes. These branches and activities are:

• the production, distribution and supply of power and energy;

• communications and postal services; and

• healthcare.

The legislature’s decision to withhold the right to strike in these branches and activities was based on the fact that they are of great public importance and the services they provide are for the whole of society.

This legal restriction on the right to strike was strongly opposed by trade unions. In 1996, they brought a case in the Constitutional Court challenging its constitutionality . The Court ruled that the legislation in question complied with the Constitution, mainly on the grounds that exercising the right to strike in the abovementioned branches and activities would 'create an obvious and immediate danger for the life, security and health of the population'. In its decision, the Constitutional Court referred to restrictions on the right to strike in international labour legislation and practice.

This ruling led the leadership of the representative trade unions (BG0307204F) again to focus their efforts to have the strike prohibitions revoked on amendments to the relevant legislation. Employers' organisations took no clear position on the issue. Unions held several meetings with ministers, during which the government at first reportedly expressed a willingness to review the strike ban affecting workers in healthcare and telecommunications, though insisting on retaining it in the power supply sector. Despite these apparent promises, in late November 2003, based on the insistence of the ministers of healthcare and the economy, the cabinet changed its intentions and refused to support the repeal of the prohibitions on exercising the right to strike. This forced the trade unions again to change their tactics and to focus their efforts on parliament. They started new discussions with the leaders of parliamentary groups and lobbied members of parliament, calling again for the strike bans to be revoked.

There are no mechanisms for resolving collective labour disputes in the branches and activities where strikes are prohibited. Bulgaria has no efficient and trusted mechanisms for impartial and rapid conciliation between parties to a collective labour dispute, and no statutory provisions on compulsory arbitration in such conflicts. Trade unions refer to recommendations from the International Labour Organisation's Committee on Freedom of Association that so-called compensatory mechanisms should be provided for the protection of the interests of workers who are prohibited from exercising the right to strike.