Opening speech of Dr. Endre SZABÓ, President

ONLY TOGETHER CAN WE SUCCEED – this is the theme of our 4th Congress. It is meant both as a message for today and as a claim staked for the future.

The world in which we live is, both nationally and internationally, facing severe challenges. The social conflicts generated by the effects of globalisation are increasingly coming to dominate our lives. We experience every day how strong is international capital acting in concert and how able it is to move national capital in the same direction.

After the crash of the former bipolar world system and the collapse of the socialist challenge, capitalism has no threat to face and it is now destroying – for the time being without robust resistance – the welfare states which have existed for decades in the more fortunate states of Europe, while nipping in the bud their establishment in our region. The key words and phrases are ‘reduction of public spending’, ‘withdrawal of social provision’, ‘restriction of payments on grounds of economic performance’, cutbacks in employees’ rights and the rise of employee commitment. This attitude, above all in the recent past, is tangible also in the policy of the Hungarian government.

Fortunately, lessons learned from nature are also applicable to how the world operates in general: at different speeds, of course, but everything is always seeking equilibrium. Into this process slots the happenstance of the civic movement getting stronger worldwide. An important station on the same evolutionary path is the unification of the two global union organisations, which seems to be followed by a more rapid rational integration in all countries – and so also in Hungary. I do not think it would be by coincidence that the recently held ETUC Congress emphasised that the intensity and efficiency of union interest protection and enforcement activities should be increased and the volume turned up right across the media. And let us believe: our strong association and decisive performance will, in the short or longer run, coerce capital to practise social responsibility and reduce its hunger for profit. The moment will come when the saying “ONLY TOGETHER CAN WE SUCCEED” will turn into a self-fulfilling prophecy.

I do not know how long this journey will take. But I am convinced that we cannot help but make the individual and collective intellectual efforts to strive for this, at the end of which process we may arrive at answers as to the basic questions determining both the fundamentals and the quality of our lives as well as the opportunities for future generations. I continue to worry over the questions which have hovered over the last 18 years.

In matters of slogan-production we are good: there was and is no deficit here. However, there is a lack of well-founded concepts and answers which take the actual Hungarian situation into consideration. Settlement is also exacerbated by the enmity between the political forces, the parties, which eclipses any rational dialogue on matters of destiny and makes joint action impossible. Government aims which are worthy of support experience artificial barriers and proposals from the opposition which are worth considering disappear into thin air. The political elite has a profound responsibility for this set of circumstances and if it is not ready very soon to take steps to deal with them, it will commit an unforgivable sin against society. The fight to hold power must not overwrite the law of engagement and responsibility as regards the people.

SZEF has been emphasising for over a decade that only the result of dialogue with different social groups, only the search for consensus and compromise, will be able to project for us all a picture of the state that is in alignment with our common will. This is not a dimension which could be determined by a state reform committee alone – even a gifted one.

The standpoints currently in vogue on the role of the state are in stark contradiction to each other. The government in office applies – under strong neo-liberal influence – a massive pushing back of the role of the state; the extension of privatisation; and, instead of public resources, the rise of the role of competition and the market. The opposition declares the restriction of the presence of the state and the massive cuts in state resource allocation to be without foundation and unnecessary. Cast between two millstones, torn between basic values and the need for a secure existence, lives the majority of the people, amongst them hundreds of thousands of civil servants and public employees.

Our confederation cannot call enough attention to the fact that the interpretation of perceptions of the role of the state and of public service, as well as the formation of their practice, is the responsibility of politics, primarily that of the policy of the government. According to the standpoint of SZEF – and, in this respect, many independent national and international scientific conferences have confirmed our view – the specific circumstances of Hungarian society do not allow the rapid withdrawal of the state from sectors which fundamentally determine the basic provision, social situation and quality of life of the people. The state, however much it is stressed by capital, must not unreservedly delegate its constitutional duties to other organisations. And it would be a drastic failure to forget that, besides the paradigm of the state household balance which we also qualify as significant, there exists also another, equally important balance: that of society, together with the ardour of the people living in it. The motivation to look after oneself can be a perfectly proper aim, but it is not unfair to point out that a significant part of Hungarian citizens is not, due to their material situation, able to do so.

The country is saturated with so-called reforms. I do not have sufficient fingers to count the number of reform experiments we have undergone. The majority have been suspended or aborted and discredit the word ‘reform’ as well as the expectations that lie behind it. There is, however, now a great resolve for the realisation of the principle of reform.

SZEF’s relationship with reform has been unchanged for at least a decade. It may sound paradoxical but, in the stability which is one of the strengths of our confederation, flexibility has the room to express itself. Under both individual and collective learning processes, we have adapted ourselves to the challenges of our age. Accordingly, we have never questioned reform intentions where these are backed up by time and scientific findings. The information society is one example. We have never been against reform which aims to improve the standard of provision and the equality of access to it, or which seeks to develop engagement and empathy towards benefit recipients. We have always immediately and actively supported aims which de facto improve well-being and the quality of life of the people. We have also assisted without question steps towards a more rigorous collection of taxes and social contributions, the reduction of illegal work, a system of medical care which is based on insurance and the re-engineering of certain structures. This includes those which seek to establish co-operation within local-area associations or other rational frameworks.

SZEF has not allowed itself, regarding a single reform issue, to take the easy option of simply saying ‘no’ to everything – a comfortable stance which would not require it to take any responsibility. Through the organisation of scientific national and international conferences, with the publication of educational materials and criticisms of failures based on professional arguments (I refer here also to the material we published in connection with the Green Book on Medical Services), we have been keen to use the whole of the field open to us. If I wanted to be seen as very modern, I could also say that SZEF has demonstrated behaviour which lived the need to be proactive.

We are aware that each change goes hand-in-hand with threats to interests and is likely to encounter resistance.

Experience has shown that, today, social resistance to particular measures is greater and wider than would have been possible to model or calculate. We see the main cause of this in that the realised measures are led, in the main, by the coercion of the programme of convergence. Thus, instead of the additional investment accepted as a fundamental precondition of successful re-engineering moves, massive cuts stand at the top of the agenda. The result is that the practical realisation of different sectoral reforms – with a focus particularly on the health sector – is professionally ill-conceived, unsatisfactory as regards the conditions and desultory in its tempo, while the argument style from case to case ranges from the arrogant to the cynical.

Such a view seems to be endorsed by everyday events. Health and education reforms do not activate in the majority of people understanding, but instead uncertainty and antipathy. The communications message “everything is to the benefit of patients, students, pupils and beneficiaries” is not credible: the target group of the reform perceives and experiences the measures in direct contradiction to this.

It is our duty to emphasise here also that the preparation and realisation of the measures require more well-founded and prudent work, as well as respect for society’s interests. This implies also that decision-makers need to listen more intently to the voices of the professional and interest representation organisations concerned.

Addressing ourselves from this hall also to the government, we repeat our former appeal – which actually applies primarily to the system but needs to be interpreted more widely. Simply on account of the fear of losing face, it must not delay with the correction of evident failures and damaging decisions, with the withdrawal of these if necessary, and the consolidation of the functions of the institutions as well as calling them to account. Transparency, accountability, participation and the implementation of interest reconciliation should be seen as priority tasks. The narrow, state-funded group of state reform preparation advisers should be expanded with experts in theory and in practice who are abstracted from political influence and business interests.

I have to mention specifically here the restructuring of social security, which is the object of continuing discussions. In addition, opinions concerning the former pension reforms are divergent and the same is likely to be experienced in connection with the future of the health system. SZEF’s point of view is well-defined and clear. We claim a package of basic provision which, in the framework of compulsory health insurance, provides modern and professional medical care for all. We certainly advocate uniform insurance based on solidarity and national risk levels, strictly but socially controlled with union input. This is not contradictory to the re-engineering of the current social security institution into a modern insurance company.

The Forints of contributors should not be used to finance the profits and well-known high operating costs of the private insurance companies.

Nevertheless, private insurance companies can play a role in providing additional insurance on top of the basic package which provides fair service. Holding it contrary to basic human rights, SZEF protests very strongly against the situation in which the actual development of profits and cash-flow determines whether somebody can access necessary diagnostic tests and quality therapy. Our confederation definitively rejects that positions on waiting lists may be altered by illegal payments, thus pushing needy people who are already over-burdened farther back in the queue.

It is clear that, for SZEF, it is of critical importance how the destiny and future of public service employees shapes up – and neither is the government or wider society neutral in this regard. Nevertheless, it seems that there are employers who seek to force business management methods on the public sector without a consideration of whether they are appropriate. At the same time, during personnel cuts, they quite forget that, throughout the world, the techniques of outplacement are well-known and have been practised voluntarily over a long period. A whole professional library exists on the positive effects of motivation and the negative ones of work-related stress but, in our country, a generalised uncertainty of existence, a standardised fear of the future, branches right across the public sector being damaged unfairly and unjustly, and the voicing of humiliating criticisms, are the mode – the latter mostly from people who up to now, as regards the public service, have not shown a better, or more humane, performance.

It is the clear intention of SZEF to protect the human dignity of people working in health and the social sector, in education, public administration, culture, public order, media and other sectors of the public sphere. With the aid of the power of publicity, we do our best to ensure that these people do not fall into contradiction with the professional rules of their occupation or of their professional oath.

The significant cuts in real wages this year constitute additional burdens. Also sinister are the plans for the re-interpretation of the nature of public services as well as the modification of legal relationships, aspects of which are clearly moving in a disadvantageous direction. Concerning public service relationships, I feel it important to emphasise here the professional viewpoint of SZEF: public service is a special employment policy terrain which requires the fulfilment of very different competences and duties from the business world and which also implies special responsibility relationships. Likewise, its governance must additionally be based on a specific footing. It is understandable that we are against all those who argue for and initiate, during the modification of legal relations, that the governance of public institutions should be required to fall in line with its non-professional, unfounded and causeless takeover by the rules and mechanisms of the competitive sphere. This does not mean that, in certain areas, people would be unable to change from the public to the private sector, while there are professional areas where analogous management methods can be applied. However, it does mean the establishment of a career system which guarantees public servants who meet strict professional and ethical requirements and objective performance expectations calculable progress, material security and a level of pay appropriate for self-fulfilment and a fair standard of living, as well as moral acknowledgement.

As regards the material reward of public employees, it is well-known that SZEF – in alignment with the standpoint of the union side in interest reconciliation –did not agree with the measures in the convergence programme which burdened employees in a disproportionate manner. It clearly protested against a pay freeze for 2007 and 2008, a step that we are convinced was both baseless and artificial. Interest reconciliation negotiations which aimed at providing a resolution failed. For this reason, for the first time since the system change, a joint public service strike committee was established.

During the negations, it became clear that the government was, regarding pay, unable to escape its own convergence commitment to the EU of a two-year pay freeze for public sector workers. After releasing the strike appeal, the possibility was identified to seek a conciliatory solution minimising the damage which ultimately led to the known agreement. This agreement has aroused in many people a considerable feeling of rejection and, sometimes, their brutal opposition. We do not question the justness of dissatisfaction, but the complaint of foul play we qualify as unfair. We were able to remove the danger of cutting the 13th month pay and achieved from July this year up to the end of next an additional, across-the-board, monthly payment of 8.3% in advance, independent of position on the pay scale. We have a written promise for the first half of next year for a payment of 2 weeks pay, which means a de facto wage rise, as well as a pay rise of at least 4% from January 2009 and the 13th month pay due in January 2010 being paid in December 2009. It was also fixed that wage negotiations for 2008 will begin in August this year.

SZEF has questioned the accountability, extent and task-specific realisation of personnel cuts. We can see the agreements and established programmes we have concluded with the government in this regard as a simple result of our damage-limitation intentions, as a means of reducing the disadvantageous consequences and supporting new job opportunities. In the next period, SZEF has to win the gains embodied in these documents.

Among the viruses causing the sickness in the system of public institutions over a long period has also been the over-proliferation of political influence and unjustly frequent organisational and personnel changes; in the case of the employment of managers, subjective, personal criteria other than mere professional competence; while, as a result of the bad pay conditions, negative factors have come to play a massive role in career selection. Today, we are aware of an additional phenomenon. “Not in general… but” violations have appeared inside schools. “Not in general… but” it happens that a patient is called three times to the hospital for surgery; the third time, preparatory work is even carried out – but then the patient has to return home because of a lack of capacity. And I could go on with these “not general… but” examples. I do not go along this. Just as everyone here in this hall knows so, outside, in society, everyone can also count. Then, think ahead – if all this continues in this way, who will want to be hired as a public servant, teacher, doctor, fire fighter, police officer… in a word, as a servant of the public? This trend also has a sharp moral side which we have to answer collectively: what kind of society will it be and where does it lead when provision for premature babies is restricted by limitations on numbers?

At each level of management, we need leaders who are aware of their responsibility for the people and have empathy for them and the public sector as a whole, and who bring appropriate leadership experience and quality performance while being able to do their jobs in a humane manner.

And last but not least, we have to ensure that our own house is in order too. The world around us, EU membership and the changes in our national environment also require from unions that they re-think their role. Besides the troubles and problems within the labour world, we have to face society-related political problems as well as challenges at the EU level. Thus, we have to think precisely concerning what kind of changes are necessary in our traditional way of thinking as well as in our programmes, structures and tools.

The next few years thus come with a huge workload for SZEF. We have to improve the professionalism of our work, as well as the personal and material conditions. In our daily interest representation work, we have to show a stronger presentation of our standpoint and establish a more well-founded, constructive negotiation style and a more courageous system of interest protection tools. Naturally, this should not mean that we question the priority of the intention of reaching agreements.

We have to be more active in supporting social and civil organisations in their struggle for reducing poverty and unemployment rates and improving the living conditions of the needy. We have to take on a greater role in the tasks of employment and consumer protection and lifelong learning, as well as in outlining strategies for retirement, health and education policies. We have to look out for support coming from the EU, above all the implementation of that which aims at better operating conditions for the public sector.

The improvement of our organisational capacity is indispensable. Through supporting SZEF’s youth organisation, SZEFIT, via demanding active engagement and co-operation with it, we should make unions more attractive to young people. We have to take greater care of the need for equal opportunities in everyday life. We need to have cognisance of the gaps in our policies on women and to strengthen our representation work concerning the interests of older people.

We should initiate closer co-operation between union confederations, as well as inside SZEF. It is our duty to make the relationship between our confederation and ÉSZT richer in content and more efficient. In the future, we must also not give up seeking the implementation of the vision of a unified public service union.

We should practise correct, objective, constructive and agreement-centred behaviour in social dialogue, as we claim the same attitude from the social partners sitting on the other side of the negotiating table: both government and employers.

We have to maintain our independency of political parties while we should be open towards co-operation with all parties, parliamentary factions and other organisations engaged in public service matters and ready to support our agenda.

It is significantly in our interest to strengthen our international contacts with union confederations and to expand our bilateral contacts as well.

Lastly, and with particular emphasis, I have to mention the maintenance of unity and the basic values of SZEF. The fundamental pillars of our federations are social sensibility, social justice and solidarity. The determinants of our behaviour are accountability, objectivity and moderation, allied with agreement-centred but certainly interest enforcement and the representation of the interests of employees working in the institutions of the public sector, regardless of the type of their legal employment relationship.

These values have been the foundation for the development of SZEF into a modern and influential confederation, with a name for itself in society. During the 17 year-history of SZEF, we have fought many battles. And even if we have not always returned with the flag of victory, we have developed ourselves, learned from our failures and fashioned an image of the future. These things have forged the power lying within us which can give fresh impetus to the further development of our confederation.

And let’s not forget:

ONLY TOGETHER CAN WE SUCCEED. BUT TOGETHER WE WILL BE SUCCESSFUL!