The management of FB Groupe and the company’s staff delegation, with the support of OGBL and NGL-Snep, recently signed a social plan.

The social plan is part of the company’s decision to cease production of reinforced concrete slabs. This decision will directly affect 21 workplaces.

The social partners were informed of the company’s intention to proceed with the collective redundancies on January 17, and negotiations took place within the legal deadlines.

Of the 21 employees affected, five will potentially be eligible for early retirement due to corporate restructuring.

Six other employees will be able to start a new job in another Luxembourg company belonging to the Willy Naessens Group, of which FB Groupe is a branch.

Incentives and guarantees linked to their current contracts will be offered to employees who agree to work for the other group company.

In addition, special arrangements have been negotiated for the remaining employees who will have to leave the company.

These employees will be given priority for re-employment within the company and will also be the first to be informed of any vacancies at the Willy Naessens Group in Luxembourg.

The negotiation of the social plan took place in an atmosphere of good will.

Communicated by OGBL and NGL-Snep,
February 16, 2024

On January 25, 2024, the government announced that several branches of the construction sector would be declared to be in crisis. This announcement applies to construction companies whose main activity is “construction of residential and non-residential buildings” (14,000 workers) or “demolition and site preparation” (1,400 workers). In order to cope with the difficulties they are facing, the companies concerned will be able to apply short-time work between February 1 and the summer of 2024. The measure adopted by the government provides for short-time work for a maximum of 20% of the workforce per company.

The OGBL supports the government’s decision. It guarantees that the workers concerned will remain employed, at least in the short term.

However, the OGBL insists on the importance of ensuring that there is no abuse by certain companies and that short-time work – financed by taxpayers’ money (!) – only benefits those companies that are facing real difficulties due to the slowdown in activity in the sector.

Ensuring that public money is not wasted remains a constant concern in the OGBL’s approach. This is also one of the reasons why the OGBL has always favored the negotiation of individual job protection plans (plan de maintien dans l’emploi – PME) with companies in difficulty. Such PME make it possible to find, situation by situation, the most appropriate measures: short-time work, if necessary, but also loan of workforce, early retirement, etc. The OGBL has concluded and continues to negotiate such PMEs in the sector.

The OGBL recalls that it can only accept a job protection plan for the construction sector on the express condition that it is not limited exclusively to the possibility offered to all companies of applying short-time work. In addition to the negotiation of a global sectoral agreement on working conditions, the OGBL demands that this sectoral PME should also provide for the possibility of using all the measures offered by the legislation and not only short-time work.

Finally, the OGBL would like to draw attention to one of the main causes of the “crisis” currently affecting certain branches of the construction sector. This is related to the housing crisis in Luxembourg. In addition to the exorbitant housing prices that the country has been experiencing for several years, interest rates have recently risen spectacularly, making it very difficult for ordinary people to buy a home and slowing down activity in certain construction branches mechanically. At the same time, the limited access to home ownership has led to strong pressure on rental properties, resulting in exploding rents.

In this context, the OGBL calls on the government to take ambitious measures in the area of access to housing, in the interest of both households and the recovery of the construction sector, as well as the preservation of jobs.

Press release of the OGBL Building Syndicate, January 25, 2024

The OGBL Construction Syndicate called on workers in the sector to demonstrate on December 7 at the Casino syndical de Bonnevoie. For better working conditions! For secure, quality jobs. And against flexible working hours.

From the outset, José Nicolau Nunes Pinto, president of the OGBL Building Syndicate, set the tone: “We are here to defend our collective agreement. It is this union that will allow us to fight against employers who are becoming more and more petty, arrogant and selfish. Let’s not forget that the bosses have lined their pockets thanks to us. It’s time for them to share their wealth with us.

It’s been two years since the collective agreement in the construction sector expired, and the OGBL has been fighting with the sector’s employers’ federations to negotiate a new collective agreement. “They’re refusing to negotiate seriously, and it’s scandalous,” says Jean-Luc De Matteis, central secretary of the OGBL Building Syndicate.

And yet, for decades, employers have largely benefited from the dynamism of the construction sector. construction sector. As Jean-Luc De Matteis points out, construction companies themselves are often investors and developers who have benefited greatly from the rise in property prices. “The increases in housing and land prices and land prices have largely gone into the same pockets.

It should be pointed out in this context that developers’ profit margins are 20-40% of the price of a house, which represents tens of millions of tens of millions of euros earned on the backs of employees. employees.

“No company in the construction industry can say that its margins have not been high enough in recent years, that its profits have not been high enough, and that its order books have not been full enough. But this is what the employers have been saying from the very beginning of the negotiations,” denounces the OGBL’s central secretary.

Over the past two years, the employers have used every possible argument to slow down the negotiations. “First there was the war in Ukraine, then inflation due to rising energy prices. Despite all this, we proved to them, with figures to back it up, that the sector was doing well. After a three-week standstill at the start of the Covid pandemic, the construction sector was also one of the first to take off again, posting a stunning recovery. “And this recovery, it was you who made it happen, with overtime. The sector has come out stronger.”

According to the employers’ federations, wages and working conditions are currently satisfactory, so there is no reason to consider increases. However, as Jean-Luc De Matteis points out, if wages and working conditions were really so good, then how can we explain the labor shortage that the sector is currently suffering from!

The OGBL acknowledges that the negotiations to renew the collective agreement are taking place in a slightly different context than in the past and that “the construction sector has been in a slowdown phase for several months. But, as Jean-Luc De Matteis points out, not all companies are in the same boat. Not all companies are affected by this slowdown. The sector is not homogeneous and many companies are still making profits.

And this is another of the OGBL’s complaints against employers. Since 2022, “employers have been crying wolf in order to obtain massive state aid by any means”. Employers’ federations are now calling for a sectoral job protection plan, which the OGBL opposes. “Not all companies are equally affected by the temporary shutdown. It is inconceivable that those who are not in need push for this aid. The state should not be lining the pockets of those who have been making hundreds of thousands of euros on the backs of workers for at least a decade,” said the central secretary of the OGBL Construction Syndicate.

On the other hand, the OGBL is willing to negotiate individual job protection plans with companies that are really in trouble because of the current economic situation. However, the employers’ federations are doing everything they can to block this option and are currently putting pressure on company directors. “We are aware of letters being sent out urging companies not to enter into individual plans, especially with the OGBL. This is simply disgusting,” says Jean-Luc De Matteis, pointing out that thousands of jobs are at stake.

The OGBL also regrets that it is somewhat alone in this matter. The other union supported the employer’s position.

The final point raised at the demonstration was the new government’s announcement that it wants to make working hours more flexible – a huge gift to employers in the construction sector. “Their dream is to let workers work when they want and how they want: more in the summer and less in the winter,” explains Jean-Luc De Matteis.

In fact, the government’s announcement is a perfect response to a long-standing demand by employers’ federations in the construction sector. A measure that the OGBL considers not only dangerous, as it increases the risk of accidents, but also detrimental to workers, as it means lost wages and a loss of quality of life.

The OGBL will oppose this measure, as it has done in the past. And it won’t be able to count on the other union either…

The article was published in the December edition of Aktuell.

On October 10th, social elections were held at Patrick Farenzena s.à.r.l., a construction company based in Dudelange that employs around thirty people.

The OGBL won all the mandates up for election.

Thanks to this result, the company’s employees will benefit from the support of the majority union in the construction sector.

Press release of the OGBL Building Syndicate, October 16, 2023

On October 5, representatives of employers in the construction sector, the OGBL, the union with a large majority in the sector, and the LCGB met to discuss the situation in the construction and temporary employment sectors and the steps to be taken to respond to the current slowdown in new housing construction.

The current slowdown has several causes. The main factor, which has had a major impact, is the dramatic rise in interest rates over the past 18 months, accompanied by the decades-old scourge of exorbitant house prices, which have made it virtually impossible for thousands of households to buy a home.

Clearly, soaring property prices are primarily the result of the pursuit of excessive profit margins by developers, investors and other players in the real estate sector.

These factors have led to a rapid slowdown in the sale of new homes – and therefore in their construction – as well as in the sale of existing properties, dramatically exacerbating the housing crisis and having the perverse effect of driving up rental prices.

This slowdown is affecting the activity of a number of construction companies and therefore poses a risk to employment, given that the construction of new homes accounts for around 25% of the total activity of the sector, which is very heterogeneous from company to company.

For the OGBL, it is clear that maintaining employment must be an absolute priority. It’s a priority that the OGBL has been stressing to employers and politicians in recent months.

At the meeting on October 5, the introduction of a job protection plan (plan de maintien dans l’emploi – PME) was discussed.

The employers’ federation is calling for a sectoral plan to maintain jobs that would cover the entire sector, regardless of the economic situation of individual companies.

For the OGBL, this discussion of a “one size fits all” solution is completely misguided.

In view of the very different situations of the companies in the sector, it is important to consider possible measures individually, company by company, in order to maintain the employment of workers in the sector. Given that a large part of the aid, such as job protection plans, training, loans for temporary workers and short-time work, is paid for out of public funds, i.e. by the taxpayer, it is important that this aid be returned to the companies that really need it, and not to those that are operating normally and continuing to make a profit.

The OGBL didn’t wait to act

As the union representing workers in the sector and a key player in the social dialogue, the OGBL did not wait for this meeting to take action.

At the request of the OGBL, the situation had already been analyzed at a recent meeting with the Minister of Labor, Georges Engel, and the Minister of the Economy, Franz Fayot. Among other things, the OGBL demanded that all possible measures be taken to preserve the jobs of the thousands of workers in the sector. Government representatives supported this position. It was also agreed to examine on a case-by-case basis all the situations of the various companies in difficulty and to take all the necessary measures to safeguard the jobs that may be threatened.

On October 5, the OGBL presented its proposals for reviving activity in the new housing sector and for finding lasting solutions to the housing crisis.

The OGBL warns against distorting such an important instrument as the National Tripartite for reasons of political sensationalism and purely electoral purposes.

Quick solutions needed

The OGBL is ready to support all initiatives aimed at finding lasting solutions to the housing crisis affecting thousands of households who can no longer afford to purchase a home for their own needs, revitalizing the new housing construction sector and securing employment for thousands of construction workers.

However, the OGBL strongly opposes the creation of investor incentives such as a further increase in accelerated depreciation or a 3% VAT for investors.

These proposals are not designed to help households looking for a home, but only to increase the profit margins of investors and developers with taxpayers’ money.

The OGBL, on the other hand, is committed to solutions that can be implemented quickly to help households acquire or build a home, and thus to help companies currently affected by the slowdown in activity and to guarantee the jobs of the workers affected.

Press release of the OGBL, October 5, 2023

On the initiative of the OGBL, an information meeting was organized on July 25th at 7:30 am at the headquarters of the construction company Manuel Cardoso in Kirchberg, Luxembourg. The purpose of the meeting was to inform the 110 employees as fully as possible about the situation of the company, which was probably heading for bankruptcy.

Immediately after receiving the first concerns expressed by the workers, the OGBL contacted the company’s management in order to obtain all the necessary information and to understand the seriousness of the situation.

At the information meeting held on July 25, OGBL representatives informed the workers of their rights in the context of this bankruptcy, which is expected to be declared in the next few days. The OGBL will provide assistance and support to the workers affected by the bankruptcy, particularly with regard to filing claims and other administrative formalities required in the event of bankruptcy, so that the workers can benefit as soon as possible from the benefits provided by law.

The OGBL has already contacted the employers’ organizations to try to place the workers with other companies that are looking for manpower as soon as possible.

Any workers who need further assistance in dealing with this delicate situation can of course contact the OGBL teams who will guide them through the process.

Press release from the OGBL Building Syndicate,
July 25, 2023