With the objective of reaching out to more youths and strengthening the East Asia family, the very first East Asia Youth Network was convened on 2 March 2010 in Ulaanbataar, Mongolia. At the meeting, subregional secretary of East Asia, Mr Koichi Ito, introduced the PSI youth policy and resolution 20 which had been adopted by the Executive Board on succession planning and on its main purpose and also on how the East Asia region will be  supporting PSI activities and goals for the benefit of the young workers.

Ms. V. Lakshmi, our newly appointed Regional Secretary also spoke to the young workers representatives in support of the PSI youth policy, its main aims, campaigns and activities. She said “by strengthening solidarity with other sub-regions and regions, we will be able to preserve, as well as nurture, the next generation by sharing experiences and knowledge.”

Ms. Tan Sze Wei, APYN coordinator then followed up with a presentation on the Asia Pacific Youth Network and its activities and goals. She shared what the Network had done, explained how the APYN began and described the impact the Network has had up till today. Without a doubt, the APYN had a formidable outreach and the participants were certainly impressed and all pledged to build it up further. None of us doubted that we as young workers have a very relevant and important role to play for the future of the labour movement.

Many new friendships were forged as young worker representatives from the East Asian affiliates: Japan, Mongolia,  South Korea and Taiwan shared issues relating to young workers from their countries and mingled among themselves freely. They sincerely hope that the meeting will continue to be held annually.

The new Network elected their new coordinators: Ms. Hong Soo Jung from KNEW, Korea and Ms. Tomohiro Hasegawa from JPSU, Japan. They will work together with other coordinators in this region. This above report was prepared by Tan Sze Wei participating on behalf of APYN. For more information, please contact Mr. Koichi Ito, EA Sub-regional Secretary: itok@psi-jc.jp

The ITUC is relaunching its youth blog and is launching the campaign’s brochure. The Youth blog comes with a redesign, new functionalities such as Facebook and Twitter sharing as well as a special campaign section.

The brochure is a best practice guide on organising young people and is aimed at informing young people in trade unions about the wide range of work covered by trade unions at the international, regional and national level. The brochure is available for download on the campaign section of the blog. If you would like to receive printed copies for your union members, please contact us.

On the campaign section of the blog, you will also find various others links and tools such as Joe’s pictures for your websites and publications as well as Joe’s ringtones for mobile phones. Don’t forget to say thank you to Joe by becoming a fan on Facebook or by watching his video

Short report by Katie Rowsell, CPSU and Oceania Youth Network Coordinator

In October CPSU members in a government call centre in Sydney, Australia reported that staff were having to keep a diary of their toilet breaks.  Staff were also being told to take no more than three minutes to use the bathroom. If at least 92% of their time was not on the phone they were “threatened” with counselling and disciplinary action. This time off the phone included time spent on some work activities, including processing claims and other paperwork. Some members even reported management had “popped in” to the bathroom to hurry them up!

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PSI Asia Pacific Regional Office is committed to implementing the 30% quota of young members participation in all activities in this region. Recently about thirty young members participated in the QPS Workshop in Manila, Philippines from 1 to 3 December 2009.

Chiranjibi Guragain, Youth Network Coordinator of Nepal gave me a brief report on his participation. He explained that QPS is core campaign of Public Services International and its public sector unions.

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“We may have different religions, different languages, different colored skin, but we all belong to one human race.” – Kofi Annan 

by Ms. Tan Sze Wei, APYN Coordinator

The 2009 Durban review conference was held in Geneva, Switzerland from 20 to 24 April 2009 to evaluate progress towards the goals set by the 3rd World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimnation, xenophobia and Related Intolerance held in Durban, South Africa in 2001. As I was in Geneva to attend PSI constitutional meetings in the same period, I took some time to attend parallel events for the conference in the afternoon of 20 April 09.

The International Labour Organisation (ILO), together with International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) and other trade unions, held the side event “Combating racism in the world of work” on 20 April 2009 at 3pm. The session was chaired by Mr Kari Tapiola, ILO Executive Director, Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work sector, ILO and the panelists were, Ms Gulnara Shahinian, United Nations Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, Ms Kamalam from the International Trade Union Confederation, Equality Department, Mr Sipho Ndebele from the Government of South Africa and Mr Khulile Nkushubana, General Secretary of the Confederation of South African Workers Union. In total, there were more than 60 trade unions under the leadership of ITUC, together ! with GUFs such as PSI who had come to lobby for equal treatment regardless of gender, race, sexual orientation, social status etc at the workplace. All of us firmly believed that there should be employment equity in terms of recruitment, wages and promotion etc.

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“Women and youth have similar impacts on market liberalisation and privatisation, in particularly public services. In many countries, there are gap between the poor and the rich. Decent work on gender equality and youth should be the center of the labour market, ” said Ms. Masako Uemoto, AP WOC Vice-Chair on her message opened Asia Pacific Regional Organisation joint workshop ” Trade Union, Gender and Youth”. The joint workshop was organised by AP Women’s Committee, AP Youth Network and Cambodian affiliate union was held in Phnom Penh, Cambodia on 6th April 2009. Forty nine participants were actively involved on discussion and sharing to carry out the objective of the workshop:

• To strengthen the efforts promoting gender equality and equal opportunities;
• To coordinate the exchange information and share best experience on strengthening the committee/network;
• To work on responding common global trends affecting women and youth

Two resource persons was invited, Mr. Alonzo G. Suson (ACILS, Country Program Director in Cambodia) - click here for his presentation - and Mr. Nuon Veasna (ILO Workers’ Education Project in Cambodia) and presented situation regarding Cambodia Labour Movement and the Trade Union Rights of Public Sector Workers in Cambodia - click here  for his presentation -.  Continue reading →