The Global Union Federations (PSI, UNI, IndustriALL, ITF, BWI and EI), together with the Trade Union Confederation of the Americas (TUCA) and the Brazilian Committee in Defense of Public Enterprises joined forces to fight against the privatization of public enterprises and services and to defend the promotion of decent work in the Americas. These organizations united to celebrate World Day for Decent Work (October 7th) by organizing a Trade Union Forum in defense of public services, institutions and jobs.

The Trade Union Forum of the Americas defended that "what’s public stays public" as a fundamental principle, particularly in times of crisis, for sustainable development and quality of life of the population. The final declaration that was read out loud at the conclusion of the meeting included the following statements:

• For a New Social Contract, with decent work and universal access to public goods and services.

• For a democratic State, a public budget at the service of society and for tax justice.

• Against the privatization of the State and corporations assuming control of public companies - if it is public, it belongs to all of us.

• We demand that what is public remains public, because if it is public it belongs to all of us!

The declaration also stated that, “the coronavirus pandemic and shutdown measures to contain it, have made visible what we have been denouncing for years, the shortcomings and flaws of the current model of government and global economic policy which has created a large and growing concentration of wealth in the hands of a few, and the lack of access to quality public services, universal social protection and decent work for the masses of workers.”

The fact that privatized services prioritize the interests of transnational companies over those of workers and the general public was also highlighted. The importance of the union movement at the local and global levels in the struggle against privatization and for democracy and the establishment of alliances with other sectors of society was made clear. Participants also demand progressive tax reforms to finance public services and that “billionaires and large transnational corporations pay their proportional share of taxes.”

The organizations that signed the declaration also expressed their rejection of free trade agreements and investment protection agreements, "which also favor the interest of large transnational corporations, deregulating the State, promoting privatization, prioritizing the rights of transnationals over the rights of the working population, including decent work, and deepening the agro-extractive model that destroys the environmental and cultural heritage of native peoples.”

To respond to the crisis of the neoliberal model and promote a just transition towards a sustainable society with decent work, the organizations that signed the declaration propose the construction of a new global social contract, through which "the State and public policies should play a central role in favor of the population excluded by the current political-economic model.”

Download the declaration in spanish, portuguese or english:

Trade Union Forum of the Americas

Hundreds of people from various countries from all over the region joined the event live. More than 400 union leaders directly via the Zoom platform and around 6000 people watched on the Facebook pages of TUCA (in Spanish), PSI (in Portuguese) and UNI Americas (in English).

A welcome greeting from the Council of Global Unions was offered by TUCA General Secretary Rafael Freire. Highlighting the crisis of neoliberalism, Freire pointed out the need to confront the neoliberal state, which has been reduced to a minimum, the need for trade union movements to demand democratic states, the guarantee of labor rights and that decent work be at the center of any proposal for a way out of the crisis. "There must be state intervention to promote full employment, economies that work for the people, redistribution of wealth and put work at the center, recognizing its role in the reproduction of life," said Freire, who emphasized the unity of trade unions. "We articulate, we meet. We advance in a permanent mobilization".

Daniel Chávez, from the Transnational Institute (TNI), opened the first block of the forum by explaining debate about the role of the public sector has changed on a global scale due to the pandemic. That is to say, those who had defended the adoption of neoliberal policies today defend the importance of the State to respond to the pandemic. "It's something we've known for a long time," he said, while simultaneously warning against a new wave of privatization.

Susana Ruiz Rodriguez of Oxfam spoke of the importance of tax justice in financing public services. She stressed that Latin America is the region that has suffered the most from the pandemic economically and will have the slowest recovery. Rodriguez noted that it is necessary to address the inability of most governments in the continent to adopt progressive tax policies that allow for adequate financing of public services. "Government decisions in this area are mostly poor, insufficient and inadequate. Taxation is low and places an excessive burden on work and consumption, and very little on wealth and profits. Therefore, she concluded, there is a need for a "new tax normality", with greater collection, reduction of regressive taxes and more taxes on capital, in addition to ending of tax havens, among other measures.

The former president of Brazilian public bank, Caixa Econômica, Maria Fernanda Coelho, presented an overview of the various crises Brazil is going through and highlighted the importance of the role of public banks for the countries' economies and the reduction of inequality. According to Coelho, the actions of Caixa Econômica during the pandemic have allowed more than 60 million people to receive emergency aid to face the crisis. Coelho also recalled that during the 2008 global economic crisis, when former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva was in his second term, private banks decreased their credit offer while public banks increased it.

The final speaker in the first block was Ernesto Murro, former Minister of Labor of Uruguay. Murro reflected on possible explanations for the electoral defeat of the left in the recent national elections in Uruguay, despite the advances achieved during the 20 years of the Frente Amplio governments that enjoyed unity between political parties and the labor movement. For him, it is a sign that the world is changing and that regressive sectors are advancing, resulting in the weakening of democracy and the depoliticization of the population. To respond to this, according to Murro, it is necessary to respect different ways of thinking, to adopt a language that is accessible and understandable to the people, and to unite and coordinate the labor movement. “Throughout the pandemic, the role of the State and solidarity have been strengthened around the world. We have to be able to take advantage of this opportunity.”

Trade union experiences

The second block was organized in order to exchange union experiences in different sectors. Rita Serrano, from the National Committee for the Defense of Public Companies in Brazil, opened the session by highlighting the urgency of defining a series of globalized policies and actions from civil society. "If capital is globalized, our actions must be the same". According to Serrano, the committee was created based on the need to confront the privatization project that has intensified since the 2016 parliamentary coup against former Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff. "Our focus is on the debate with society. As the former minister of Uruguay has said, we must dispute the narrative regarding the role of the State. We must make the population aware that everything that is collective is geared to the interests of the citizens, while the view of the private is for the consumer".

Mark Dimondstein of the United States Postal Workers Union (UNI) gave a brief account of the struggle of these workers against the privatization of the postal service in the United States, which would mean job cuts and the deterioration of services. "Only in the public sphere could postal services expand. We are in a political moment of recognition of the value of public services and the collective," he said. He called attention to the fact that millions of people in the country will vote by mail in the presidential elections in November, which has caused the current president to increase pressure and question the reliability of the postal service. "The mail service is not for sale, what is public stays public," he concluded.

The struggle of public transit workers in Mexico City was the subject of a presentation by Benito Bahena of the Alliance of Tramways of Mexico (ATM - ITF). He recounted the persecution of union leaders by the Mexican capital's government and company authorities in 2015 and how the workers carried out a campaign to save the trolleybuses through a sustainable, safe, and economic transportation project that resulted in the acquisition of 200 new vehicles and the implementation of more lines. "We will avoid privatization by all means," he said.

Edwin Palma, of the Colombian Petroleum Industry Workers Union (USO - IndustriALL), affirmed that the workers of this union have always been engaged with the defense of what is public in the face of threats to privatize the sector. "We have always been threatened by governments. When the extreme right-wing President Alvaro Uribe entered, he opened the company to private capital, although it remains mostly public. We have dedicated ourselves to defending it".

Oscar Rodríguez, of the Confederation of Water, Sanitation and Environment Workers of the Americas (Contaguas-ISP), said that democratic management of water and sanitation must be based on social control and public financing. But, according to him, many governments are creating public-private companies and public-private partnerships with the aim of favoring large corporations and promoting the commercialization of water. "However, we have been engaged with various strategies of resistance," he said, mentioning that the struggle is taking place through the Waterlat Network, in addition to Contaguas. "Our priority is the struggle to close the door to privatization and achieve the democratization of water through the construction of social and trade union processes. We are fighting to guarantee that states constitutionally safeguard water as a human right and not a commodity, and that water systems have adequate public financing, are sustainable over time, and that better fiscal controls that prevent tax evasion are applied," he explained.

Comberty Rodríguez, from Education International (EI), outlined the threats to the education sector brought about by the pandemic, including the intensification of the use of virtual educational platforms, managed by large corporations. "Once the pandemic is over, a great challenge in each of the countries with respect to public education systems is virtuality versus presence," she said. According to Rodriguez, there is a consistent vision in the international institutions such as the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), the World Bank and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), and even the UN, based on a private sector approach that homogenizes of what is happening with education around the world, a logic that serves corporate interests.

Claudio da Silva Gomes, from the National Confederation of Unions in the Construction and Wood Industries (CONTICOM - BWI), detailed how the construction industry was destroyed by the Brazilian corruption investigations known as ‘Operation Car Wash, resulting in dramatic increases in unemployment. "The consequences of this investigation have eliminated the country's capacity to produce its own infrastructure," he reported.

Finally, the situation in the Caribbean was presented by Helene Davis-Whyte, of the Jamaica Association of Local Government Officers (JALGO - ISP). Sister Helene explained that the Caribbean territories have been under extreme pressure to privatize their public services. "These policies have been proposed by the international financial institutions as part of the conditionalities in places where there are assistance programs. However, these efforts have failed, as most public services in this region remain under government ownership and are operated by the government," she said, affirming that Jamaica is an exception, were several services are privatized. Davis-Whyte also shared some union activities in the region against the growth of public-private partnerships which are being presented by governments as a way to finance public services but which have the same problems as privatization. In conclusion, Davis-Whyte highlighted that the fact that healthcare is public in the Caribbean and that this is what allowed the response to the coronavirus pandemic.