European Trade Union Committee for Education

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On 28 Ocotber 2022, the cooperation pilot project between ETUCE, UEN and TUS on “Capacity Building in Education Social Dialogue at Local Level in Serbia” saw its launch.

The joint initiative seeks to foster primarily capacity building on sustainable and continuous social dialogue in the education sector through the promotion of implementing national collective agreements on local level.

More specifically the pilot project is to:

• promote continuous and transparent social dialogue, communication, and exchange of information on a regular basis between local authorities and education trade union representatives on local level in Serbia.
• encourage effective implementation of national collective agreement in the education sector on local level.
• foster transparent and continuous involvement of all relevant actors within existing economic and social councils on local level in Subotica, Pozarevac, and Leskovac.
• lay the foundation for the preparation of a joint recommendation between local authorities and education trade union representatives on establishing social and economic councils in municipalities where they have not been established yet.

“The cooperation of education trade union representatives with representatives of school administrations and local governments can and must be improved, and the satisfaction of employees in education in relation to the implementation of agreements reached depends to a large extent on the quality and results of the communication on local level”, stated TUS.

“While all the consortium partners recognise that social dialogue and continuous cooperation between employers’ and workers’ representatives in the education sector is a key for a prosperous functioning of modern societies, the partners acknowledge that the institutional social dialogue on local level is not yet recognised in Serbia. Thus, this pilot project is to pursue more sustained work and communication with social and economic councils that had been established in Subotica, Pozarevac, and Leskovac. International experience, and good practices on the cooperation relations between employers’ and education trade union representatives of the Union of Education Norway and ETUCE in capacity of a recognised social partners at European level will contribute to the successful project implementation”, concluded Susan Flocken, ETUCE European Director.