EU EQUAL THE LIBRA PROJECT

Organisation

The Libra Project was born after discussions at the Swedish Central Construction Board This authority is kept informed of developments in the project and, in its turn, regularly passes on information to the regional Construction Boards in the provinces.

The origins of Libra lie in the expected shortage of manpower in Sweden and the building trade. As the large number of people born in the 1940s gradually retire new sources of labour must be found. Hitherto, the trade has mainly recruited male Swedes and there are still few women or immigrants on building sites. To recoup its loss in manpower during the next few years the trade needs to widen its recruiting base. Earlier attempts have shown that it is not so easy to introduce new categories of people into companies, and we must therefore discover the reasons for this and devise measures to counteract negative attitudes. In future we must also make greater efforts to keep the labour that today leaves the trade for some reason or other.

The fact that this aspiration is identical to society's desire that all people, irrespective of origin or gender, shall have equal opportunities on the labour market naturally makes the project even more urgent.
Experience has shown that it will take a long time to achieve lasting changes. The Libra project has therefore concentrated more on creating effective tools for bringing change about than the changes themselves.The parties that have so-operated to form the Libra Project are representative of those in the Swedish Central Construction Board and in the regional Construction Boards;

Sif - The Swedish Union of Clerical and Technical Employees in Industry
Sif is the biggest white collar union in Sweden with some 298 000 members, within the Construction sector some 15 100 - 7 900 male and 7 200 female members, tries to organize all white collar employees within the private sector in Sweden. We work with all traditional trade union questions and pay - at present - special attention to working environmental issues, equal rights (gender), training/requalification, salary and pensions.

Byggnads - the Swedish Building Workers Union
Byggnads is the leading blue collar trade union in the Swedish construction industry. Byggnads has around 100,000 members, basically among carpenters and bricklayers but also plumbers as well as several other smaller professions in the construction sector. The members of Byggnads build everything from houses to bridges. Painters and electricians are not members as they have their own trade unions. Byggnads has an extensive geographic cover through 32 local branches, each with several employees.

The main objectives for Byggnads are to negotiate wages and other benefits in the collective agreements. Safety at the work place and insurance benefits are other key areas. Byggnads has also, by tradition, a good relation with the political sector as decisions by government and parliament to a high degree have an impact on the construction volume.

Galaxen - The Galaxen company
Galaxen works with a back-to-work-model for unemployed and partially disabled construction workers. It is privately owned by the five largest construction companies and the federation of construction industry. The Galaxen consists of seven regional companies in a corporation. Regional rehabilitations boards were organized and consisted of representatives for employers, trade union, social insurance, employment office and for health care. Here decisions were made to employ the partially disabled worker in the Galaxen.

BI - The Swedish Construction Federation
BI is the Swedish Construction Federation and the trade and employersí association for about 2 300 private construction companies incl. the main companies, PEAB, NCC, Skanska and JM. The core activities are modern employee relations in construction companies and continued deregulation of the Swedish building trade.

A central controlling body has been formed from the above participants and representatives from the National Labour Market Board as well as Ynsab (a commonly owned enterprise), which is responsible for administering the project.

Furthermore, there are regional control groups for the regions selected for the project. People from the regional Construction Boards also sit in these control groups.

In the short term, Libra anticipate being able to set the process of change rolling in the building trade. During the three years allotted to the project questions relating to the equality of opportunity between women and men and segregation can be tackled.

In the long term, it is the aim of the building trade to see that the composition of its work force reflects that in society as a whole. It is our vision that workers of both genders, with a Swedish or a foreign background, are the future on which the building trade will rest. As we believe that greater diversity would benefit the trade we have made it Libra's aim to concentrate on these questions and thus broaden the field from which we recruit.

Background
Co-operation between the National Labour Market Board and actors on the labour market began in Sweden as early as 1959, with experimental work between Construction Boards in some regions. As this proved very successful, it was later extended to cover he whole country.
There are 21 regional Labour Market Boards. The regional Construction Boards, which meet regularly and deal mainly with the following issues, act as advisory bodies to the regional Labour Market Boards.
o Spreading out the available work force over the seasons, the aim being to avoid extensive unemployment in winter and during depressions.
o Recruiting labour
o Making prognoses of coming jobs to arouse the interest of future school-leavers in working in the building trade.
o Training labour
Unemployed building workers require further training. The regional Construction Boards have a great deal to say about what training is necessary and how it should be planned.
One of the partners in the project is the Galaxen, an enterprise whose aim is to prevent injury to building workers and, with the support of the regional Construction Boards, takes care of handicapped building workers with the object of returning them to the labour market again. Such workmen are given jobs which suit their capacities in various firms. There they can work at a less stressed tempo and can also be used to train apprentices.

SUMMARY EQUAL PROJECT LIBRA
Although the labour market in the construction industry always have been open for workers of both genders traditionally it is a typically male industry. As a result, gender distribution is very uneven, among both blue-collar workers and the white-collar employees. Project Libra is a project whose aim is gradually to achieve more even gender distribution, partly by including more girls to choose courses in building techniques at their secondary schools and the university, and partly by making the few women already in the trade to stay on. With this object in mind, we wish to ascertain what needs to be done as regards building sites, the way work is organised, etc. to make construction work more attractive to women.

To enhance the multi-cultural aspect and to counteract discrimination and social isolation at work, the project Libra also intends to use various methods of increasing the number of people with foreign background in the building trade. One part of project Libras is to make use of, and develop the competence available among immigrants with experience of construction industry. Another project inside Libra is to inform young people with a foreign background of the fact that they are welcome to apply for the technical education on different levels. Via project Libras transnational partners we know that the picture of integration problems is the same in France as well as in Portugal and Belgium. The goal for the transnational work is by the use of each others experiences find strategies that make it easier for the target groups to be integrated in the trade.

As we believe that a multi-cultural work force has a beneficial effect on work at the building trade, we intend to try to change the negative attitudes towards women and persons with foreign background that can be found in the construction industry.

 

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