Labor policies, civil war memories focused on May Day

Antagonism between the Finnish coalition government and the trade unions was reflected in the May Day speeches in Finland on Tuesday.

A recent governmental plan to allow temporary work contracts for young people and the proposal to ease dismissals in companies with less than 20 employees have fueled verbal flare-ups from left wing speakers and trade union representatives.

Jarkko Eloranta, chairman of the blue collar central organization, SAK, told a mass meeting at the Helsinki Railway Square that hatred is the underlying force of the current government in its labor market policies. He said "small actions are not enough" to counter the hatred against organized labor, national broadcaster Yle reported.

Ann Selin, chairman of the large service sector union, PAM, said the current government has destroyed the structure built during the past hundred years to protect people against inequality.

Antti Rinne, chairman of the main opposition party, Social Democratic Party, said the conflicts in the labor market will increase.

Li Anderson, chairman of the Left League party, told a mass meeting in Helsinki that the government has increased uncertainty in the lives of young people and young women in particular.

From within the ruling coalition, the Blue Finns Party secretary Matti Torvinen claimed in the cabinet the Blues were able to block the plan intending to scrap the general applicability of labor tariffs. He said his party had practically prevented a general strike.

The Finnish law on general applicability of union tariffs guarantees union salaries to everyone, being a union member or not. The rules have been criticized strongly by entrepreneurs and employers.

Even though in the opposition, Jussi Halla-aho, the chairman of the populist Finns Party did not single out the government as the culprit, but said increased immigration is to blame for lack of housing and shortage of social services. "A small country cannot afford being the social assistance supplier for the whole world", he said.

The relationship between the coalition government and labor organizations has been tense since the 2015 election. Earlier in 2018, the policy for "activating the unemployed" triggered mass demonstrations.

As the spring 2018 marks the centenary of the end of the Finnish civil war, recollections of fate of the defeated reds were unusually prominent in the speeches of the left wing politicians on Tuesday. Wreaths were laid on the graves of the reds executed in the aftermath of the civil war in 1918 or perished in prison camps.

In Jyväskylä, central Finland, speakers at the mass grave said the current preference for short term work arouses fear. Local politician Ari Harlamow said the debate of 1918 must be continued as "the class society has not been dismantled", newspaper Keskisuomalainen reported.

The Finnish civil war between the whites and the reds in January-May 1918 claimed 37,000 lives, in all on both sides.