Several thousand employees at Nokia offices in the Finnish cities of Tampere and Oulo have this afternoon walked out in protest against the mobile phone maker’s employment practices, the Finnish Confederation of Salaried Employees (STTK) said.Nokia spokesperson Arja Suominen said it appears the action involves less than half of the 9,000 employees that are employed at the two sites. They are making use of flexitime arrangements to leave their desks early today, she said.
The walk-out is linked to Nokia’s plans to cut jobs primarily in its enterprise solutions and technology platform units, where talks got underway yesterday.
Last week, Nokia said it intends to lay off about 340 staff at operations in Finland over the next few months, though some of those may be offered other jobs within the group.
‘We don’t understand that, after the best results in history, they start co-determination talks and pay the worst bonuses in years,’ state broadcaster YLE quoted a union official in Tampere as saying.
The action is expected to continue through Friday afternoon.
Some more information from Reuters:
Nokia spokeswoman Arja Suominen said the company had been informed of the planned action later on Friday, but declined to comment on the number of staff involved. She said Nokia had not had significant strikes or walkouts anywhere in the company’s recent history.
"They are very rare," she said.
Any Nokia employee care to talk to me about this? The conversation will be private. You have my word.