Risk of Norwegians being unable to buy alcohol above 4.7% from stores

Wine bottles on VinmonopoletWine bottles on Vinmonopolet.Photo: Gorm Kallestad / NTB scanpix

The staff at Vinmonopolet (the only stores that can sell alcohol above 4.7%) want to have an influence on their occupational pension, but management has said no. It could mean strike which would mean the stores would close. The employees say they plan to “dry” Norway.

Norway can experience their first Vinmonpol strike of 30 years. The reason is that Vinmonopolet rejects the demand from trade union and Commercial Office for influence over the pension scheme for employees.

– Not one pole is going to stay open. Now we are planning how to dry Norway in the best possible way, says Christopher Beckham, HK’s lead negotiator in this wage, to the free trade union movement.

This means that chances are high that all of the roughly 320 stores will be closed from mid-September.

On Friday evening, September 17 it becomes clear whether the employees in Vinmonopolet will stop working. Then mediation between HK and LO State on one side and the employers’ organization Range on the other, will be done.

The parties were unable to agree on a new two-year collective agreement when they negotiated with each other before the summer holidays.

Now it is up to the National mediator to find a solution.
Commerce and office requirement is to put in place a text of the agreement to ensure that employees receive influence over service pension if it is changed.

Employers say it is totally unacceptable to honor the request.

 

Source: NTB scanpix / Norway Today