On 8-10 June 2023, an international seminar on "Equal opportunities in the labour market and equal pay for equal work: the mandatory pay transparency system, the pay gap and the European Union's gender equality strategy" was held in Vilnius/Lithuania, organised by LPS „Solidarumas“ (Lietuvos Profesinė Sąjunga „Solidarumas“) in cooperation with EZA and funded by the European Union.
The event started with a visit to the Foreigners Integration Centre at the Vilnius Archdiocese Caritas. The head of the centre made a presentation about the activities, programmes and projects of Caritas. Trade union representatives were interested in the integration of foreigners into the labour market, they were asking questions and discussed how trade unions could be more effectively involved in helping foreigners integrate.
On 9 June, the first session of the event focused on equal opportunities policies in the workplace, and the elimination of violence and harassment in the world of work. Rūta Juodelytė, a representative of the Equal Opportunities Ombudsman's Office and an expert on equal opportunities integration, shared her insights with the participants. She presented the steps for the development and implementation of gender equality policies in the workplace. Due consideration should be given to Article 7 of the Equal Opportunities Act and Articles 26 and 30 of the Labour Code regulating this sphere. Equal opportunities should be ensured in the recruitment process, in the evaluation and remuneration of the employee, in the provision of career opportunities, in the process of ensuring and adaptating working conditions, including reasonable accomodation, and in the provision of a safe working environment. According to the expert, age and disability are the main grounds for discrimination in recruitment.
The issues related to the prevention of psychological violence at work were reviewed by Edvardas Kviatkauskas, Chief Inspector of the Psychological Violence at Work Prevention Division of the State Labour Inspectorate. He focused on Paragraph 1, Article 30 of the Labour Code, which stipulates that an employer must create an environment in which an employee or group of employees are not subjected to hostile, unethical, degrading, humiliating, aggressive, abusive, insulting actions that violate the honour and dignity, physical or psychological integrity of an employee or a group of employees, or that are aimed at intimidating, humiliating or putting an employee or a group of employees in a defenceless and helpless position. Paragraph 4 of Article 30 of the Labour Code specifies that an employer with an average number of employees of more than fifty who has followed the information and consultation procedures laid down in the Labour Code must adopt a policy on the prevention of violence and harassment, publish it in the usual way in the workplace and implement it.
Dr Ramunė Guobaitė, a researcher representing the Lithuanian Social Science Centre, presented the study entitled "The goals of preventing violence and harassment in the workplace: honour and dignity or/and health protection". She informed about the in-depth interviews conducted on the initiative of the Lithuanian Centre for Social Sciences between May and June 2020 with individuals (98% women) who believed that they had experienced psychological violence in the work environment between September 2017 and June 2020. One of the six questions asked in the questionnaire was "what stressful experiences were you exposed to and what other negattive consequences did you experience?". In their responses, respondents emphasised health-related consequences (regardless of age, education or professional experience). Stress at work in Lithuania affects the dynamics of chronic non-infectious diseases, injuries and suicides, and the most common age group for suicide in Lithuania are people of working age (45-59 years). The Lithuanian Health Programme for 2014-2025 highlights the need to pay more attention to a safe and healthy psychosocial work environment.
The session was moderated by Daiva Kvedaraitė, Secretary General of LTU "Solidarumas".
A later session focused on the labour market situation and the gender pay gap. Ramunė Grigienė, representative of the Employment Service of the Republic of Lithuania, gave a presentation on "Employment distribution by gender in Lithuania, future trends". In Lithuania, women's participation in the labour market is one of the highest compared to other EU countries. The employment rate of women (15-64) in Lithuania in 2022 was 73.6%, one of the highest in the EU (6th out of 27 EU member states). Ahead of Lithuania in this area are the Netherlands, Estonia, Sweden, Denmark, Finland and non-EU countries such as Iceland, Norway and Switzerland. The male employment rate was 73.9%, higher than the EU average (69.8%; ranked 17th among EU member states). The largest gender gaps in employment are in Greece (19.1% points), Italy (18.1% points) and Romania (17.1% points). The highest employment and the smallest gap between men and women are in the highly educated group. The lowest gap is in the low-education group.
Representatives from Germany presented the project "Work at any cost?", an ERASMUS-funded international project targeting the most vulnerable women in the labour market. LTU "Solidarumas" is the project partner.
Psychologist Odeta Šakėnaitė gave a comprehensive overview on the topic of precarious work. In the presentation, she focussed on trying to find an answer to the question "Why do women choose low-paid work?" The session was moderated by Jovita Pretzsch, Vice-Chairwoman of LTU "Solidarumas".
Regina Jarošienė, a member of the Board of LTU "Solidarumas", moderated the discussion entitled "Wage differences and how to avoid them". Kristina Krupavičienė, President of the LTU "Solidarumas", presented the opinion of the European Economic and Social Committee and stressed that gender equality is a cultural issue and therefore the responsibility for it must be taken by society as a whole. The expectations that mere political will and legislation will improve the situation in reducing wage differenes are unfounded. The involvement of the social partners in promoting gender equality is important, as it is in many ways directly linked to the labour market and working conditions. Collective bargaining is an important tool for achieving gender equality in the world of work.
Participating in the discussion were: Irina Semjonova, representative of the Latvian Joint Police Trade Union, Maria Jeskova, International Secretary of EAKL, the Estonian Trade Union Confederation, Dr. Christina Herrmann and Karin Reisige NBH, Uwe Terhorst, Christian Democratic Workers' Union, Germany, Jolita Kazlauskaitė, President of the Workers' Union of UAB Sūduvos vandenys, representatives of SAUATT, the Independent Albanian Trade Union for Food, Agriculture, Trade and Tourism.
The afternoon session continued with a discussion on work and pay. It was entitled "Equal work for equal pay, how can we achieve that? Ensuring equal opportunities in pay and career development". The session was moderated by Ričardas Garuolis, Vice-Chairman of LTU "Solidarumas". Kristina Krupavičienė, President of the LTU "Solidarumas" and Stanislavas Fedaravičius, Head of the Labour Inspectorate of the LTU "Solidarumas" shared their insights on the accessibility and transparency of pay systems and the role that trade unions should play.
Implementation of equal opportunities policy in social service institutions - this was the title of the presentation by Alma Nevierienė, Deputy Chairperson of the LTU "Solidarumas".
Sonata Vyšniauskienė, PhD student at the Demography and Family Research Unit of the Lithuanian Social Science Centre, presented her dissertation entitled "Parental leave and gender (in)equality in the labour market: expert evaluations".