Dince the 2017 labor orders, company agreements have prevailed over branch agreements in a majority of areas. However, is it a question of strengthening social dialogue closer to employees and developing, as desired by the Auroux laws (1982), citizenship at work? In reality, quite the opposite is happening. The establishment of social and economic committees resulted in a considerable reduction in the number of staff representatives and in distancing them further from employees to make them “professionals” in social dialogue, only a very small minority of companies (1.6 % in 2021) having chosen to retain “local representatives”.
More than a lever for social progress, the priority given to company collective bargaining is first thought of as a means of further subordinating the rules of the salary relationship to the imperatives of competitiveness of companies, that it serves to develop the profit-sharing and individual increases rather than general increases, to lower the rate of increase for overtime or to make the organization of working hours more flexible.
Of course, the use of negotiation mechanisms and their results remain variable. In large companies, when employees are qualified and unions maintain a real activist base, their representatives remain able to influence management decisions. However, under shareholder pressure, the nature of the compromises is changing. Unions are struggling, in particular, to prevent the generalization of remuneration policies linked to individual or collective performance.
In large companies in the cleaning, home help or logistics sectors, negotiations are even more unbalanced, as it is difficult for unions to mobilize work collectives that are fragmented, precarious and made up of a single workforce. interchangeable work. In the health and social sector, in particular, subject to cost reduction policies, salary negotiations in companies remain purely formal.
Amplified inequalities
In reality, the same trend is emerging everywhere: that of a considerable reduction in the room for maneuver available to trade unionists and management in negotiations which are taking place under the pressure of the financial markets for some, of the principals for others. others, or budgetary constraints that the State imposes on the sectors it subsidizes.
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