Amnesty Turkey 'walks away' from collective bargaining, says union

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Amnesty Turkey has walked away from collective table with the Sosyal-İş union affiliated with DİSK Confederation of Progressive Trade Unions (DİSK), the union said on Wednesday.

Releasing a statement, the union asserted that Amnesty International was endangering the workers' union rights, noting that the negotiations started after a two-month delay.

The union said that the collective bargaining agreement that had been signed for five consecutive terms over 15 years was "declared null and void" by Amnesty International.

Employees expressed that their organizing rights had been taken away, and they were subjected to a meager pay raise dictated in an economic crisis environment.

However, the employer side denied these allegations, stating that the claim of "walking away from the table" did not reflect the truth. They also said that they had made a wage increase offer much higher than the inflation data provided by the Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat).

"Amnesty International refuses to recognize Sosyal-İş"

Amnesty International employee and union representative Mehmet Onur Yılmaz said that Sosyal-İş had been recognized as a legitimate union for five terms, but it was suddenly raised as an issue during the recent meeting.

He said that the institution advocated for human rights, including labor rights and the right to organize, and said, "By walking away from the table, our unionization process has been hindered."

Yılmaz mentioned that their call for the employer to return to the negotiating table was unsuccessful. He reported that the institution responded, "There will be no collective bargaining agreement covering the year 2023 in any form."

Yılmaz said, "In this context, we withdrew our demands and proposals, which were rejected by the employer and were specified in 11 concrete items, in order to enable an agreement on the collective bargaining agreement. Additionally, we revised our demands regarding material rights and presented them in our meeting on May 2nd."

However, Yılmaz said that Amnesty International "imposed" a raise of the annual inflation rate of 39.5% against their demand for a 55% raise. He continued by saying that 27 employees were affected by the situation:

"Due to a regulation made by the Ministry of Labor years ago, unions like Sosyal-İş were brought under the authority. Previous managements of Amnesty International accepted Sosyal-İş as legitimate. In fact, we included the agreement on the validity of collective agreements concluded without the authority of the International Labour Organization (ILO) in our recent collective bargaining agreement. However, at this point, Amnesty International declared that they do not recognize Sosyal-İş.

"If you are a human rights organization, you should fight against the authority issue imposed by the government. Amnesty International not only disrupted the negotiation table but also left its employees to face a crisis situation alone. There is a serious housing crisis in Istanbul. Rents have been skyrocketing for years. In recent times, almost all of our employees have ended up in disputes with their landlords. No one feels safe about housing. We are facing eviction lawsuits and verbal or written harassment.

"Therefore, we proposed an offer that took these factors into account. However, Amnesty International came back to us with an offer significantly lower than what we proposed. Their proposed raise of 39.5% is even lower than the raise made to the minimum wage. Furthermore, there will be another raise to the minimum wage in July.

"We tried to determine a rate based on the living standards in Turkey and the poverty data published monthly by Türk-İş [Confederation of Turkish Trade Unions]."

"Statements do not reflect the truth"

Ruhat Sena Akşener, the Turkey Director of Amnesty International, stated in an interview with bianet that they did not understand the Sosyal-İş's statement saying they "walked away from the table."

Akşener, who said that the expression "walking away from the table" does not reflect the truth, stated, "As Amnesty International and the employer, we carried out a consultation process with the union spread over months, and we agreed together that if the contract is not signed within 60 days from the start of the negotiations, it will be referred to as a deadlock. Therefore, it is not walking away from the table; the lack of agreement is due to the conclusion of the period as a result of the agreed procedure."

Akşener also added that Sosyal-İş is an unauthorized union, and this situation is not new. She said, "Sosyal-İş has never been an authorized union. This situation has been valid in all previous CBA signing processes as well." She also mentioned that the fact that Sosyal-İş is unauthorized was not used as a reason for not signing the CBA.

Akşener denied the statements that the wage increase was based on the data from the Turkish Statistical Institute (TÜİK). She stated, "Our obligation is to use the TÜİK data, but we used the Istanbul Chamber of Commerce (İTO) rate, which is much higher and more realistic. The information that the TÜİK data is being used is not true and accurate."

Temporary workers went on strike

Amnesty International had received criticism after it was revealed in May 2017 that they had employed temporary workers.

The fundraisers who described their work and collected support for campaigns, went on strike in May 2017 due to the temporary employment practice.

The team, who were employed as temporary workers, criticized Amnesty International, stating that they were talking about something beyond the law and that it was unacceptable for Amnesty International, as a human rights organization, to do this.

"A one-sided decision"

Sosyal-İş released another statement yesterday, saying that Amnesty International's walking away from the table endangered the workers' union rights.

In their statement, the union said, "The employer, despite our repeated inquiries and even recording them in meeting minutes, has not been able to explain the reason for terminating the negotiations based on the 60-day period they determined. The termination of the CBA negotiations was entirely a one-sided decision."

The union, mentioning that they see Amnesty International as a common value, called on the management of the organization to avoid making statements that would damage its credibility. They also invited them to resume CBA negotiations as soon as possible.

The union stated, "The direction of our statements is to reach a compromise within the framework of our CBA proposal and to defend the union rights of our members. We believe that the General Assembly of Amnesty International, which will be held this weekend, will also support our members' union organization, just like many other human rights issues, and will support a solution based on the CBA." (HA/VK)