social dialogue for sustainability in building. go for “broad”, the fillea cgil project approved by the european commission

To completely change the business model of the buildings, transforming itself into driver of a sustainable growth instead of the role of soil devouring, it is not an enlightened choice of the individual company or the individual country but something that the old continent and the entire planet need. For this reason, the green economy is the great challenge of the third millennium, a challenge that the European countries and all social actors must be able to face. To do this, we need to strengthen immediately the social dialogue as the starting point for a strategy that places the reorganization of the production and the transition to a sustainable economy at the core. This, in an extreme recap, is the guiding principle of the project “BROAD – Building Green Social Dialogue”, presented by Fillea CGIL and recently approved by the European Commission. The project will involve trade unions from four European countries, research centers, employers’ associations, with the aim to achieve, at the end of the trail, a proposal of Guidelines supporting social dialogue in the transition towards green building, for development of the labor market and growth, in the name of quality and respect for the rights, health and professional skills of workers.

“With the project partners – Di Vittorio’s Foundation, the European Federation of Trade Unions of the Buildings, a study center of Germany, the construction trade unions of Poland, Spain, Belgium, Filca Cisl and Uil Feneal, Ance – we will study the main trends in the development of green building both at national and European level and the successful models to be spread through the exchange of experiences and best practices between countries and the social partners,” says Fillea’s General Secretary Walter Schiavella “valuing those experiences and positive practices of social dialogue that gave birth to sustainable processes in the industry and produced economic growth and quality employment.” The Broad project will be organized “with workshops and meetings involving representatives of employers and workers, institutions, experts, civil society and keeping in consideration not only the green building industry, but sectors and professions related to the green economy, in a horizontal perspective too. ”

There will be two phases during the project. A first phase of investigation, which will finish at the end of 2016 with a European report containing: the context of Community policies on green economy and green building; an overview of initiatives in support of green jobs at European level through a review of scientific and institutional literature; the comparative analysis of the different experiences of the countries involved in the project, a description of the role and functions of social partners, in order to make suggestions and recommendations to strengthen the social dialogue in the process of the conversion into green building. The second phase will end in December 2017, with the creation of “Guidelines” for social dialogue in the green building at European and national level, which will be the result of intense exchanging activities planned in Italy and in the other countries involved and of the discussions between the social parties. This “network” of social dialogue in the construction industry is going to have a dedicated website (accessible from two domains: [http://broad.eu] broad.eu and [http://greendialogue.eu] greendialogue.eu); a strong presence on social media is planned too and the creation of an hashtag: #greendialogue. In the end, live streaming of the various workshops and conferences planned in Italy and in the other partner countries will be available.