22nd GENERAL CONFERENCE

PRECARITY OR SOLIDARITY? THE ROLE OF WORKERS’ EDUCATION IN BUILDING THE 21ST CENTURY GLOBAL LABOR MOVEMENT

General Secretary’s Report

MINUTE of the IFWEA 22ND General Conference

Saturday 5 December – Mon 7 December 2015

Hotel Jose Antonio

Lima, Peru

1. Opening of the General conference

The President of IFWEA, Susan Schurman opened the conference and welcomed all the delegates to the first IFWEA conference hosted in LIMA Latin America.

“We meet today at a time when the world looks very much like it looked when our movement for workers education was founded. When all over the world, workers are under threat, where they are forced to move from country to country, without welcome in many cases, because our fellow members of the working class do not understand the reason for this movement, do not understand the source, its roots in neo liberal economics around the globe.

For over 100 years the task of workers education has been to provide workers with the knowledge to confront this problem and so we have titled this conference PRECARITY or SOLIDARITY and we will spend the entire time, today, tomorrow and in the workshops on Monday, and if you will stay for the OLA Seminar on Tuesday, we will be talking about our plan, what will we do, what is our task as the world’s only NGO specifically focused on Workers Education for the next period.”

The President informed the conference that the group is small due to difficulties encountered in obtaining Visa’s. This has significantly affected attendance from our Asian Affiliates.

The president introduced the current Executive Committee to the conference and opened the floor to Giovanna Larco, Director from PLADES, who welcomed all.

The president expressed her gratitude to PLADES and Juan Carlos for their assistance with the conference.

Juan Carlos briefed the conference on the logistical arrangements for the duration of the conference.

The president introduced IFWEA Vice President and ABF President, Helen Pettersson to the conference and gave a brief background of ABF’s role within IFWEA.

Helen Pettersson welcomed the delegates the conference and thanked all the people who made the conference possible.

Helen’s speech can be viewed at: https://www.facebook.com/?sk=h_chr

The president thanked Helen for her speech and introduced the General Secretary, Sahra Ryklief to the conference.

2. Formal Conference Proceedings:

The GS introduced the conference committee members as proposed by the Executive committee which met on the 4th December 2015.

2.1 Election of Credentials and Election Committee:

Michael Hands as the chair, Tilak Jang Khadka & Omana George.

The conference unanimously adopted the committee selection.

2.2 Election of Resolution Committee:

Conny Reuter as the chair, Trenton Elsey, Kari Antilla & Stefan Svensson

The conference unanimously adopted the committee selection.

2.3 Adoption of General Conference Agenda & Conference Standing Orders:

The GS informed the conference that any emergency motions/resolutions can be submitted before 7pm on Sunday 7th December 2015 with no more than 100 words.

She briefly went through the full programme of the conference.

The conference unanimously adopted the Agenda.

Thereafter the conference rose at 10h30

Conference resumed on 06 December 2015 at 09h00

3. Reports & Discussions:

2.1 Report of Credentials Committee

Michael Hands delivered the report prepared by the Committee. The committee has reviewed the number of affiliates which are 44 in total.

17 IFWEA members were present at the conference which made the conference quorate.

No contestations & disputes have been put forward to the Election Committee.

3.2 Minutes of GC 2011 (Annexure 1)

The minutes were unanimously adopted by the conference.

MOVED: Katri Soder SECOND: Mike Merril

3.3 Matters Arising

There were no matters arising from the Minute

3.4 Internal Auditors Report

Stefan Svennson delivered a brief report as the Internal Auditor of IFWEA. He informed the conference that all the IFWEA reports both internal & external are clear and without any mistakes. He also informed the conference that the EC has done what it has planned in the previous term. He put forward his recommendation that the congress accepts the Financial Report and the General Secretary report submitted

Stefan suggested that IFWEA continues to recruit new members and look for external resources to sustain the organisation.

3.5 Report of the General Secretary (Annexure 2)

The General Secretary presented the report to the conference.

In her report she briefly explained where IFWEA started and where IFWEA stands today.

She also noted that affiliation fees have not been changed since 2007. She requested that the conference tasks the Executive committee to review the affiliation fees in order to propose an increase.

She thanked all the IFWEA affiliates for their contributions over the 4 years. She also thanked the donors that affiliates have introduced to IFWEA.

She thanked the conference members for putting forward their leaders to serve on the Executive committee.

She thanked everyone for making direct contributions to the Secretariat through solidarity contribution, through affiliation fees, through fundraising, through information provision and dissemination, through project activities in the Global Network, through the Online Labour Academy, through the Study Circle Project and the Youth Globalization Awareness Programme.

The review was unanimously adopted by the conference.

3.6 Financial Report (Annexure 3)

Michael Hands presented the financial report.

Michael spilt his presentation in 2 parts, 4 years prior to the conference and 4 years forecast 2016 – 2019.

Since the last conference, IFWEA has undergone the annual Organisation Audits as well as the Project audits. All the annual financial statements are available on the IFWEA website.

The past 4 years has been financially stable.

IFWEA has 3 main sources of income, these being, Affiliate Fees, the YGAP Programme and OPC Projects & ABF Partnership.

2015 will see a small loss of approximately $14,000 but this was budgeted to be much higher. There has been savings on the conference and funding from FNV to subsidize GC costs.

4 years ago, IFWEA had a reserve of $38 000 in equity. At the end of 2015, it is anticipated to be at approximately $110 000.

Going forward, IFWEA is on the verge on signing a 4 year contract for core funding. The amount is still under negotiation but Michael Hands has budgeted an income of $267 000 per annum for the purpose of the forecast.

In summary, IFWEA’s finances and the forecast are in a very stable condition. The activities, finances and reserves are growing steadily.

The budget was provisionally adopted as the final amount of the core funding grant had not been confirmed. The incoming executive was tasked with adopting the final 4 year forecast at its next meeting.

4. Plans 2016 – 2019

4.1 IFWEA Action Programme 2016 – 2019 (Annexure 4)

The General Secretary presented the Draft Stratplan to the conference. The plan sets out IFWEA’s Objectives & Indicators for the next 4 years.

The General Secretary requested guidance from the conference as to who will be involved with the activities laid out in the Draft Stratplan.

The president requested that the conference breaks up into regional groups for 30 mins to discuss the plan and how each organisation fits in and how the regions can contribute to the plan.

Asia:

Stanley HO (HKCTU) reported on behalf of the Asian group. Hong Kong would like to collaborate to share media in some way on Labour Knowledge and Information as it is very difficult in Hong Kong.

AMRC has started an Asia labour school in Manilla and would like to expand to other countries. They are specifically interested in the link between women leadership and social protection.

SEWA has a labour school for Indian workers and are willing to share experiences with other countries.

Nepal is specifically interested in sharing experiences through OLA on Awareness of Emotional Labour in the Service Sector.

The Asian group is comfortable with the plan.

Europe:

Katri Soder reported on behalf of Sweden and Finland. The group is happy and satisfied with the detailed plan. Katri also noted that the plan is easy for the next congress to follow up on. The biggest responsibility of this group is the YGAP Course and they are happy to work with YGAP and develop it further and even expand it. They would like to get the Norwegians back on board on the YGAP Programme.

Niklas Skeppar reported for the second European Group. He noted that the only part missing from the plan is the Political ambition. They feel that it’s important to include politics to attract new members and make an impact.

Africa:

Sibailly Douhoure reported on behalf of Africa.

The group fully supports the plan and would like to implement exchange visits between affiliates, study circles and Online Learning (OLA).

USA:

Carla Katz reported on behalf of USA. The group thinks the plan is wonderful and very excited. They would like to focus on building a knowledge community. They would like to see YGAP expand to the United States. They are interested in learning more about the Study Circles and Intern exchange with IFWEA. This will give learners/educators an equal opportunity to participate in the Global Labour Community.

The General Secretary thanked the conference for all the contributions and comments. She will look at the comments that can be added directly to the plan. The task of the incoming Executive Committee and the secretariat will be to add the substance to the plan and make it operational for the next 4 years. The operation plan will give the details and the dialogue will start in 2016 as to how the members fits into the plan. The secretariat will draft an operational plan in 2016 for the conference attendees.

The plan was unanimously adopted by the conference.

5. Report from the Resolutions Committee.

The president introduced Conny Reuter as the chair of the resolution committee. Conny explained the voting procedure to the conference and presented the resolutions.

Resolution 1: Adoption of 2016 – 2019 Strategic Plan (Annexure 5)

Proposed by : General Secretary