16 Facts About Verdi

1.

Verdi was established in March 2001 as the result of a merger of five individual unions, all of which, other than the DAG, had previously belonged to the German Trade Union Confederation :.

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2.

Oldest forerunner of Verdi was the Association of German Printers, which was founded in 1866.

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3.

Verdi's elected successor, Frank Bsirske, was in favour of the merger and announced that he additionally planned to run for the role of Verdi Chairman.

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4.

At the subsequent founding congress of Verdi, which was held between 19 and 21 March 2001, the establishment of the trade union was formally completed and Verdi's first National Executive Board was elected.

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5.

The Trade Union Council monitors compliance with the Verdi Statute, approves the union's annual budget and year-end accounts and supervises the National Executive Board.

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6.

Verdi's divisions are oriented towards the industries and sectors of its members and are responsible for the "tasks involved in the subject-specific representation of member and company-related interests".

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7.

Alongside the divisions, the Verdi Statute stipulates that so-called groups of individuals be established on a district, state and national level.

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8.

Verdi currently has a total of eight groups of individuals:.

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9.

Verdi has been running a member network that is open to Verdi members only since December 2008.

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10.

Verdi is committed to using collective agreements to secure and shape working conditions for employees.

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11.

Verdi rejected all attempts to change employees' right to strike and announced that it planned to take action against corresponding statutory limitations, even by taking cases to the German Federal Constitutional Court.

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12.

Notably, Verdi held a series of strikes at Deutsche Post in 2015 in a dispute over pay and plans for a new parcel division.

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13.

Verdi is a member of multiple global union federations such as the UNI Global Union, the International Transport Workers' Federation, the International Graphical Federation, the International Federation of Journalists and the Public Services International.

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14.

Verdi publishes a multitude of different magazines for its members.

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15.

The weekly news magazine Stern reported on Verdi, stating that its divisions, state associations and districts "worked against each other more than with one another".

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16.

Critics accused Verdi of taking a strong stand in favour of employee rights and fair wages in public but not aiming to achieve these goals on an internal level.

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