Support the Swedish construction workers' strike!

As of yesterday, April 13, 2016, Byggnads - the Swedish Construction Workers' Association - has gone out on strike at several dozen sites across Sweden, with plans to expand the strike to many more sites over the next two weeks if an agreement cannot be reached.

In a statement from March 30, Byggnads listed the demands it had presented in negotiations with the Swedish Construction Federation (Sveriges Byggindustrier), the employers' organization it is now striking against. Among them:

• end dumping of wages and conditions as a result of long contractor chains
• improve workplace safety and training for safety officers
• ensure that immigrants who choose the construction profession do not have worse wages and conditions than others who also choose to work in construction
• greater influence over employers' actions that violate employees' personal integrity
• wages and conditions for construction workers hired through employment agencies to be equal to those of other employees at the workplace they are hired out to

"Sveriges Byggindustrier," the statement notes, "will not go along with any of this if Byggnads does not at the same time go along with major changes for the worse to union influence".

One of the sites now out on strike is only a short subway ride from where I work; early yesterday afternoon I went out to offer my support. I met with two striking workers, Dennis and Martin, who were glad to speak with me for a few minutes about the strike.

They reiterated the union's position that its current influence over wages and conditions was not a point of negotiation; they would not support any compromise over that issue in order to get the Federation to consider their other demands. The whole site was not out on strike, as there were other trades at work that were not involved in the negotiation, but they felt that the issues Byggnads was striking over would affect them as well, sooner rather than later. Martin pointed out that the four companies making up the Federation had earned 4 billion SEK (US$500 million) last year, and that the demands Byggnads was putting forth would only cost a total of 500 million SEK (US$61 million). "Plenty left over for them to go buy plenty of peanuts," he noted.

Both were adamant that unity was the key to winning the strike, even if they were unsure that they would be able to convince the other trades on-site to go out at this point. But they are still willing to hold out while the strike expands and to stay out for as long as they need to.

A Facebook group, Vi stödjer Byggnads och Målarens strejk, was created early yesterday and has garnered support from around Sweden and from other trades and professions. Messages of international support with the hashtag #backastrejken (Back the Strike) would no doubt be greatly appreciated.