In Germany, printing workers’ 123-days strike exposes broken public procurement system

In early summer 2024, the printing workers went on strike at Bundesanzeiger Verlag in Cologne, Germany, over its refusal to negotiate a collective agreement. They demand a 35-hour per week, 30 days leave entitlement per year and binding entitlement to vacation and Christmas bonuses. The publishing house belongs to the Cologne-based DuMont Group and is one of its most important sources of income, generating between 18 and 22 million euros in profits per year.

Bundesanzeiger Verlag, a specialised legal publisher that releases official publications by the German state, was partially privatised in 1998 and fully privatised in 2006. However, the now-privatised company largely depends on public contracts, even though it has consistently undermined the collective agreement once in place.

When Bundesanzeiger Verlag was not yet privatised, its workers were covered by the sectoral collective agreement for employees in the printing and media industry. This labour agreement now only applies to a very small number of employees. In the last few years, working conditions have deteriorated to an alarming extent – and this is directly linked to the company’s attempts to attract public contracts. In order to win tenders, a series of measures have been put in place to the detriment of the employees: from wage suppression and temporary contracts to the recruitment of agency workers.

The fight for collective bargaining

Today, just under 700 employees work for Bundesanzeiger Verlag, but an estimated 200 of them are on fixed-term contracts. Moreover, 200 temporary workers are employed by temporary employment agencies that are not bound by collective agreement in the publishing house. Now, the workers and their union ver.di are calling for a company-specific collective agreement similar to the one in the printing and media industry in North Rhine-Westphalia. Ver.di called for collective bargaining at the end of last year, but the company has rejected entering into negotiations. Instead, strikers are sanctioned, including through dismissal.

Jan Schulze-Husmann, responsible for the publishing and printing sector at Ver.di said: “It is unacceptable that Bundesanzeiger Verlag, which is part of the Dumont Group, is refusing to meet the workers’ justified demands for a collective labour agreement, especially since it derives its profits from public contracts. German lawmakers need to take action here. It is also unacceptable that striking colleagues threatened with dismissal and strike-breaking by temporary employment agencies.”

No public contracts to companies that do not respect their workers

The workers’ fight for a collective agreement at the Bundesanzeiger Verlag is significant far beyond Germany. The company is one example of the EU’s broken public procurement systems, which drives a race to the bottom for the lowest price on the back of workers. UNI Europa has been in the forefront of the fight for public procurement reform. We call for contracts to be awarded only to companies with collective agreements. This would ensure that public money is put in the hands of decent employers, guaranteeing dignity at work.

Oliver Roethig, UNI Europa Regional Secretary, said: “The treatment of workers of Bundesanzeiger Verlag is exactly the reason why we need a public procurement reform in the European Union. Public money shouldn’t finance companies that refuse to engage in collective bargaining, that drive down pay and working conditions, that use strike-breakers. We stand with the brave workers and their union Ver.di in their fight for decent work.

UNI Europa campaigns for better procurement rules

After a three-year campaign by UNI Europa, the European Commission decided to reform the EU Public Procurement Directives during its next five-year mandate. During recent hearings in the European Parliament, EU Commissioners-designate committed to overcoming lowest-price competition and promoting social criteria in public procurement. UNI Europa urged them to make collective bargaining the guiding principle in the Commission’s overhaul of procurement rules. A little over a month before the hearings, over 1,000 essential workers from nine countries mobilised in Brussels for public procurement reform that improves pay and conditions for millions of workers across the EU.

UNI Europa research shows that half of all public tenders across the EU are awarded solely based on the lowest price, often due to procurement rules. These rules overlook the social costs to communities and undermine Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s promise of quality jobs, quality services and increasing collective bargaining coverage to “support fair wages, good working conditions, training and fair job transitions for workers”.

In an open letter, over 100 leading world-leading economists, including Thomas Piketty and Isabella Weber, diagnosed that “current procurement practices – with their dominant focus on the lowest price in tenders – create market conditions that allow bidders to disregard social criteria” and expressed their support for workers’ demands for “a reform of the EU public procurement rules that strengthens collective bargaining and improves working conditions in labour-intensive sectors”.

For more information, please consult our public procurement campaign.