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– It is about the Nordland County Municipality being a major buyer. We are setting foot in a company that does not give employees the opportunity to enter into collective agreements, provincial council leader Tomas Norvoll (Labor Party) told Dagbladet Børsen on Friday.
Nordland County is the latest in a string of players to have announced a boycott of Hungarian low-cost airline Wizz Air, which will begin domestic flights in Norway in November.
Unions such as LO and Nito, as well as Prime Minister Erna Solberg, have previously announced that they will not use Wizz Air’s services in Norway, as a result of the company’s poor relations with the unions.
At the same time, the company has emphasized that it intends to comply with Norwegian law and that it does not deny employees to organize.
You think it is in conflict with EEA regulations.
Professor Finn Arnesen from the University of Oslo School of Law investigates the market, innovation and competition, among other things. He believes Nordland is probably not allowed to boycott Wizz Air, as they intend to do. This is because the Nordland County Municipality, unlike Erna Solberg and the unions, is a public institution.
– I think it will soon be said that it is an obstacle to the free movement of services, that it is basically prohibited by the EEA agreement, but that it is still legal in cases where it is about protecting non-economic considerations, he says. DN.
– I assume that Wizz Air operates legally and given this, it is doubtful that a county municipality could boycott a supplier solely because the supplier has an attitude towards union work that they do not like. This is especially true if it is not Norwegian law that regulates the employment relationship. So one may wonder if the fact that they are anti-union is reason enough. That not contributing to such ventures is protecting a non-financial interest. I doubt it is.
Arnesen says that there is a practice of the Court of Justice of the European Union that shows that calls by authorities to buy domestically or to boycott foreign suppliers are an obstacle to free movement, which is basically prohibited.
– So, as you see it, Nordland’s call violates the EEA agreement?
– Yes. Public authorities simply do not have the same freedom of action on these issues as you and I do.
UiO Law Professor Finn Arnesen believes the Nordland County Municipality cannot boycott the airline Wizz Air. (Photo: x, / NTB Scanpix)
Reject illegality
County council leader Norvoll disagrees with Arnesen’s assessment. It emphasizes that it is a question of not using the services of Wizz Air on business trips on behalf of the county of Nordland.
– We decide for ourselves. We can, when we pay for the trip, enter criteria, such as not flying first class. We can in all areas enter into conditions for what type of services we buy. I’m sure we can do that here too, he tells DN.
Note that this does not apply to private travel.
– When an employee of the county municipality goes to a meeting in Oslo, we pay for the trip. So we can say that we don’t want to spend money on a company that undermines the rights of employees.(Terms)Copyright Dagens Næringsliv AS and / or our suppliers. We would like you to share our cases via a link, which leads directly to our pages. Copying or other use of all or part of the content may only be done with written permission or as permitted by law. For more terms, see here.
