True, they discussed more.
In 2021, employee unions and employer representatives managed to conclude more agreements than in 2020, a year it is true marked by confinements which had not facilitated meetings.
Last year, the social partners signed 1,063 branch agreements - compared to 1,013 in 2020 - and 76,820 company agreements (76,650 in 2020), according to the collective bargaining report published on Tuesday by the General Directorate of Labor (DGT) .
A revival of activity therefore, even if the records of 2019 (1,227 for branches and 80,780 for companies) are still far away.
Because on closer inspection, this report shows above all that the health crisis, far from being forgotten, still had a strong impact last year, influencing the choice of themes addressed during the discussions.
Wages are the first subject of negotiation in the professional branches in 2021. This is traditionally the case, but in 2021 we note a particular vitality of the subject which is explained in particular by the delay in 2020
, notes Pierre Ramain, the director general of work.
Nearly 380 salary riders were signed in the branches in 2021 compared to 290 in 2020, i.e. an increase of 30%.
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Of course, the Covid-19, by forcing the social partners to resume in 2021 the negotiations aborted in 2020, does not on its own explain this rebound.
The war in Ukraine and its corollary, inflation, accelerated the movement.
And if 117 branches – out of the 171 followed by the Ministry of Labor – still display salary grids with at least one level below the minimum wage, 54 have been in compliance since August after the increase in the minimum wage.
In companies, the subject of wages also ranks among the priority files (20% of agreements, or 15,300).
But he is not the only one.
Transformation
Unlike the professional branches which had organized themselves from 2020 with 69 agreements relating to the overall management of the crisis (only 13 in 2021), companies still had to negotiate a lot in 2021. As a result, a
“very significant”
volume of 12,910 texts related to the effects of the coronavirus.
Among them, some 6,070 agreements concluded on the subject of working conditions.
“Two thirds of these agreements (67%) relate to telework with 4070 agreements, against 2760 agreements in 2020”
, specifies the report.
It is also 10 times more than in 2017. This
"illustration of the transformation of the organization of work"
is also very visible in small structures, where the number of agreements is constantly growing.
In 2021, teleworking led to the signing of 850 texts in companies with fewer than 50 employees.
In 2017, there were only 30.
