European trade unions sound the battle horn for growth and employment

From LO website:

"On 8 March, 2011, LO-President Harald Borsting and his colleagues from the Polish and Cypriot trade union confederations signed a joint programme declaration with a set of specific recommendations for the coming EU-Presidency.

The Trio Presidency will begin on 1 July 2011 and is shared by Denmark, Poland and Cyprus. Although the three countries' trade union movements have different viewpoints and face different challenges, they demonstrate - with this joint programme declaration - that they have one major common goal: The struggle to create growth and employment while maintaining solidarity.

- With this joint declaration, we strongly challenge the governments of the new EU-Presidency to give priority to an ambitious and socially responsible economic policy which will create growth and employment in Europe, says LO-President, Harald Borsting.

Growth and development A way out of the crisis
The LO-President believes that, in the shadow of the economic crisis, it is more important than ever that the European the trade union movements stand together and show that solidarity can be part of a strategy to fight the crisis. This must be done by pushing growth and employment to the top of the agenda of the EU Presidency.  

- The European Commission and the liberal and conservative governments in Europe are currently using the crisis as an excuse for carrying out major public spending cuts. However, the solution is not to deregulate ourselves out of the crisis. In stead, we should target the EU's resources on creating growth and employment - for instance by moving public investments forward in order to boost the economy, says Harald Borsting.

He signed the joint declaration and programme at the signing ceremony in Brussels together with his trade union colleagues. Among others, the ceremony saw the participation of the ETUC leadership."