Hjalti Tómasson, workplace inspector for Báran, Selfoss

In the last ten years, trade unions in Iceland have put increased effort into workplace inspection to fight against rights violations in the labour market. Research shows that young people and foreign workers are especially vulnerable to wage theft, harassment, and various discrimination at work.
Workplace inspectors visit workplaces to check conditions and prevent potential violations.
One of these inspectors is Hjalti Tómasson, an experienced employee of Báran union in Selfoss. As well as having experienced some very colourful, as well as sad, scenarios in his numerous workplace visits, he is also knowledgeable about the inspection’s history in Iceland.

“There are too many crooked people in the Icelandic labour market, too many companies that try to profit dishonestly off of those who do the work. Often it is about incorrect salary, people are made to work long hours without the right pay, people are cheated out of their refreshment breaks, holiday allowance and rest time. These are the most common violations. Then there are other violations that are not as obvious, like when employers decide to deduct all kinds of expenses from the workers’ salary. It can be, for example, housing cost, a gym card, abnormally high food allowance, and even bike rent. The purpose of this is to pay as little actual money as possible,” says Hjalti.

Hjalti says that violations are especially prevalent in some sectors, like construction and tourism. “The workers who come to Iceland to work in these sectors are often from the poorer European countries. They tend to come from countries with labour markets that are very different from the Icelandic labour market, and are therefore more vulnerable for deception. If you bring in workers from Poland or Romania, you normally pick them up from the airport and drive them to a hotel, or to a labour camp. You are their first contact in Iceland, and they tend to believe what you say, and not doubt it, because they are coming from a completely different labour market. The workers will just do what they are told, for the pay that they are offered. It is therefore important that we get to them right at the luggage pickup in the airport. ASÍ had established a good collaboration with Isavia, right before everything toppled in March 2020 because of Covid. The workplace inspection also plays a very important role in informing these workers about their rights in the Icelandic labour market, and about which trade union they should contact.”

Asked if any nationalities are especially vulnerable to cheating, he says that people from East European countries are primarily affected. “It is mostly people from Poland, Romania, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania and Russia. The Icelandic labour market is very diverse. I gathered the numbers some years ago, and found out that the workplace inspection had been involved with people from 111 countries at that time. A big majority, however, comes from East European countries. People from North European countries tend to be equipped with much more information about their rights, and are therefore much more likely to speak up if they think they are being cheated. It is simply a cultural difference, they come from environments where it is natural to ask questions.”

What is the most difficult situation that Hjalti has had to deal with in the job?

“It is when girls around my daughters’ age are in difficult situations, and have even been subject of sexual harassment. They are often just kids, far away from home. When they end up in difficult situations, they just want to go home to mom and dad. The most difficult thing for me is to walk into such situations and have to stay professional, while not forgetting that I am also a human. The social aspect will become a bigger part of this job than it is currently.”

Asked about volunteers who come to Iceland to work without pay, Hjalti says that the workplace inspection has also had to intervene in such cases. It is illegal to use volunteer labour for anything else than specified charity work. “The law is very clear on that. Work in Iceland should be paid. There are plenty of young people from Northern Europe, usually from well-off families, who love the Icelandic horse and are prepared to come here and shovel horse shit for no pay. These kids can afford to be without pay for 3-4 months, but the problem becomes clear when companies start to use their work for profit purposes. However, if an environmental organisation such as Blái herinn brings in a group of young people to walk around the coast and pick up trash, we have no objections to that,” says Hjalti.

Hjalti has studied the history of workplace inspection in Iceland, and he says that its history is probably as old as the history of the Icelandic labour movement itself. Going out to workplaces to check if everything is OK is nothing new. Eminent figures in the labour movement, like Sigurður Bessason, former chair of Efling, and Björn Snæbjörnsson, chair of Eining-Iðja and SGS, did workplace inspections at the start of their careers.

“If we go back to around 1920, soon after ASÍ was founded, people were concerned about the rigorous working conditions that were the norm, both at sea and on land. Kids were sent out to work as soon as they were able to – sitting idle at home was not an option. At sea, people worked until the ship had been filled, whether it took three days or a week. Vökulögin legislation, passed in 1921, represented the first big victory for the young ASÍ. Until that point, there were no limits to how long people could be made to work. There were instances where trawler workers worked non-stop for days on end, and fell asleep into the fish pile with a knife in their hands, following such work sessions. Naturally, this kind of workload was very harmful to people’s health, and they would typically last for only a few years on the job. There were no old fishermen, and they put up with these conditions because they were afraid of losing their jobs. The new law ensured trawler workers a six hour minimum rest for every 24 hours. In its early days, the labour movement was mostly concerned with working conditions, working hours, and safety issues,” Hjalti says. He adds that organised workplace inspections were first practised by tradesmen around 1940. “They were worried about all the workers that were now calling themselves carpenters and filling the sudden need for labour that came with the British army. There were great advances taking place in technical education at the time, and the professional associations were not happy to see unskilled workers taking on jobs as skilled carpenters. So, there are few things new under the sun.”

As our conversation moves closer in time, Hjalti mentions the year 2003, when an Italian contracting company called Impregilo came to Iceland to work on the construction of Kárahnjúkar power plant. He describes how Icelanders woke up to reality when they realised how the company operated, and how it treated its workers like they were disposable. They squeezed as much out of the workers as they possibly could, while taking as little responsibility for their welfare as they possibly could. When something came up, the company would simply replace a worker with another one. “AFL Starfsgreinafélag in East Iceland fought them, they had representatives in the workplace who tried to improve the conditions. When the construction was completed, and people looked back at what had happened, most people were appalled, even Icelandic politicians were stunned. In 2006, legislation on temporary work agencies was passed, and in 2010, the legislation on workplace inspection was passed, with the primary purpose to ensure that companies operating in Iceland go by the laws, rules and collective agreements. The inspection itself and the follow-up was then put in the hands of the social partners; ASÍ and SA. We have been around for over a decade now, equipped with this legislation, which gives us access to companies, that we did not have before. We are authorised to bring in the authorities – the police, the tax office or the labour inspectorate – if we see reason to.”

What kind of reception to the inspectors get in workplaces they visit?

Hjalti says that inspectors were often met with the phrase “Hvaða rugl er nú þetta?” (“What kind of nonsense is this?”) in the beginning, when entering work areas. People found it absurd that someone from the local union could enter the workplace without any warning, to check things. “This attitude has changed, fortunately. Employers have become increasingly open towards the inspection, and inspection visits have become an accepted part of owning and running a company. But there are always some employers who are just dishonest, who are criminals. It was very much tied with the tourism boom up until the pandemic. These types of people go wherever the money is. They are the companies we monitor and deal with when needed. Their business models are designed around pressing down wages, using every available method. They violate the collective agreements, break the law, and misuse people, which is a crime. Unfortunately, some people still see things the Impreglio way: that workers are disposable. You take out of the workers what you can and then you get new ones.”

I ask Hjalti about the very charged term – slavery –, and whether he has witnessed something like that in Iceland.

“If it were up to me to define the term, then I would say yes. I have been in places where I saw many of the symptoms for human trafficking, which used to be called slavery. I had to direct this information to the right places, but unfortunately, the police and the judicial system have not been equipped to deal with these cases. The fact is that there have not been any court sentences in trafficking cases, aside from maybe one. A report from the National Commissioner from last year claims that Iceland is increasingly becoming a destination for labour trafficking. This tells us that we are entering the big boys club when it comes to the buying and selling of labour. The report indicates that trade unions are the only ones who have tried to counter this development. There is zero political interest in this issue,” Hjalti states, and this clearly weighs heavily on him. He continues on the subject of labour trafficking. “If we want to keep our labour market from becoming what we see in countries we generally do not like to be compared to, we have to be given some tools, some procedures to deal with such cases when they come up.” Hjalti notes that we must not confuse labour trafficking with wage theft, but that there is certain reluctance in the system towards both these problems. “With wage theft, there is some resistance in certain political parties, Sjálfstæðisflokkur (the Independence Party) and Framsóknarflokkur (the Progressive Party), to name a couple. I have never I understood why people make a distinction between methods used to steal money. It is OK to steal this way but not that way. Stealing someone’s work contribution is just as serious as if I stole your credit card and started taking money out of it.”

What would Hjalti change if he was able to?

“We must, as a society, decide that it is not acceptable to treat people badly. It is not OK to steal people's work contribution. The only thing that many foreigners who come here to work have to offer is their work contribution. If that contribution is abused, and that abuse is allowed to go on, I am not sure that we live in a good society. It seems clear to me that the inspection’s importance is growing, because the labour market is becoming more and more complex. The labour market has changed immensely over the past 10-15 years, jobs are disappearing, new jobs are being created, and people are increasingly working from home, as we have seen over the past year. It is so important that the labour movement always keeps its eye on the ball when it comes to these changes. We cannot wait until we are forced to do something, we have to be part of the change. Changes will happen, no matter how we feel about them. They are happening right now, and they are happening faster and faster. The labour movement is conservative by nature, which is good, but we tend to be quite slow to react. We cannot miss this boat. The workplace inspection is the key if we want to be active in these changes,” Hjalti says.