Collective pacts are used by companies to weaken trade unions or prevent their formation. In 2013, 204 collective pacts were filed with the Labour Ministry. An average of 190 pacts per year have been negotiated over the last decade.
Trade unions were in the process of negotiating collective bargaining agreements at twenty per cent of the companies signing collective pacts in 2013. The prospects for trade unions in this context are very grim, as members are harassed and discriminated against. At best, they secure exactly the same benefits through collective bargaining as those given to the workers signing the pact, with the difference that the unionised workers have to pay union dues and those benefiting from the pact do not.
Although the numbers of collective agreements signed and workers benefitting from them increased during the first three years (2010-2013) of the Santos government, collective bargaining continues to form a negligible part of the country’s labour relations system. Only 9.3% of workers affiliated to family compensation funds are covered by some form of collective agreement.
As regards the number of companies with some kind of collective agreement (1,449), the rate is as low as 0.4%. Furthermore, only half of these collective agreements are negotiated with genuine trade unions and workers that have a degree of autonomy in these negotiations.