Dear sisters, dear comrades

I will talk about an employment situation of women in Finland. I will also tell you about the Democratic network of women in Finland, which I represent in this meeting. This network was founded a couple of years ago, and already in the beginning it has strongely directed to defend public services and the employment of women. In Finnish conditions these things belong together, because the public sector has been a remarkable employer of women for several decades.

During the last ten-fifteen years the employment situation of women has been in a radical change. In the beginning of 90`s Finland met a bad depression, which produced a half million unemployees. Soon after this the government started a saving program, which concerned  several socio-economic benefits, like basic unemployment allowances, and also public services. During the last few years the economy of the state has grown fast, but still the saving policy has continued and poor people have got less and less money. Why this has happened?

The membership of European Union, which was carried out in 2002, has brought totally new problems and challenges to Finland. Finland has  - according to EU`s directions -  started to reduce public services, compete them and privatize a big part of them. As the consequence of this process especially young women have lost possibilities to create working careers in the public services. They have nowadays many short-term jobs and very uncertain situations of life. Wages and social allowances cant´t guarantee safety of life anymore, because prices and rents have improved much faster than incomes. So, the poverty has increased quickly.

There are about 600 000 people, who live under the poverty rate in Finland. Many of the poors are employed, also the parts the poor children and poor retired people are increasing. The poor is the person, whose incomes are under 800 euros per month. This sum can seem high, but most poors get now much less. In addition housing is very expensive because of the climate.

Traditional northern welfare model, which was created after the second world war, has got into big troubles. The model has been based on an assumption that nearly all adults also women have permanent jobs. This ideology can still been seen, for example, in motherhood allowances. Women, who have been in the long-term jobs before the pregnancy, will get much more money than the short-term workers. Because of the strong working tradition of women we have very comprehensive public day-care system. Now this system is turning to a crisis, because the well-being elite workers dont´t want to finance it anymore. So, last times we have argued guestions like "should the poor people still get free day-care services for their children" or "should the basic education still be remained free of charge". So, the financial crisis will take to a legal crisis.

The crisis is already acute in the public health services. Patients cant´t be taken care properly, because the state hasn´t admitted enough money for wages and vacancies. Many young nurses move abroad because of the unbearable working conditions and the wage lag. Finnish nurses earn about 20 % less than nurses earn on the average in the area of European Union. This autumn they have began a labour battle and nearly 13 000 nurses have threaten to leave their jobs, if their won´t get better wages.

The democratic network of women support nurses´ demands. In our opinion the public sector needs more money and more workers. This is important to the poors also, because the services of private health centers are too expensive to them. The network demands 800 euros per month tax-free to everyone, who cant´t earn her living because of the unemployment, sickness, small children, elderness etc. These people need the basic income security, which they could get regularly from one place. Now the poors must fill several applications for the several institutions and even appeal to the court to get their money.

In 2006 network started the campaign for 800 euro`s demand.  We collected names in the streets and presented our appeal to the parliament of Finland. This happened two months ago. During the nex months we are going to remind our members in parliament of 800 euros demand and follow their policy: what they really do in practise for the poors. The network is also preparing a new appeal against the planned raises of public payments, because they are already too expensive. We will also arrange seminars and clubs to maintain the poverty discussion.

The network of Democratic women is interested in cooperation with all left-wing female movements. We think that women need a wide international network to prevent their discrimination in working life. This is not a national problem but the consequence of neoliberalistic logic of the market, which will reflect on womens´position all around the world.