Advocated, supplied for social and civic responsibility and supplying protective equipment

 

Dumitru FORNEA
MERIDIAN National Trade Union Confederation

The Romanian National Trade Union Confederations were directly involved in the consultations on the measures taken to respond to the COVID-19 crisis.

Sectoral trade unions have purchased and distributed specific protective equipment such as masks, coveralls, gloves and disinfectants. At the same time, they have adapted working environments to take account of the specific context of the pandemic.

We were especially active in the social dialogue commission that discussed anti-crisis measures with the social partners, e.g. trade unions and employers' organisations.

At the National Tripartite Council for Social Dialogue, hosted by the Romanian prime minister and attended by all relevant government ministers, we supported the proposals put forward by our member organisations, e.g. trade union federations from various fields of activity.

The most urgent requests came from the health sector, in which trade union organisations were directly involved either by providing information or by supplying protective equipment.

In addition, we made sure that the rights of people in quarantine were respected.

We aided the Romanian Government in drafting active measures to support people and companies experiencing temporary layoffs due to the crisis. The sectors most heavily affected by this were aviation and the railways, which had to reduce their schedules and take social distancing measures, losing many of their customers in the process.

Finally, one of our main focuses was advocating for social and civic responsibility in various geographical regions and for professions that needed immediate support. Our activities must continue in the post-COVID period, because the impact of this crisis will not be limited to the actual period of the pandemic. We therefore need to take active measures and strengthen the social and civic partnership with other organisations in order to reduce that impact.  

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