PSI affiliates share organizing strategies to advance care workers rights: Care Day Wrap

PSI brings together the struggles of essential care workers across public, private, and not-for-profit sectors. We are championing a transformative approach to care—one that guarantees decent work conditions for care workers while ensuring high-quality care for those who rely on these vital services.

Unions are central to advocating for the rights and welfare of both care workers and service users globally. PSI fights for well-funded, high-quality public care systems supported by a well-trained, secure, and fairly compensated workforce supported to deliver quality care.

We emphasize the urgent need to rethink care systems in our societies, integrating gender role transformation and prioritizing universal, public, and quality care services. At the same time, we oppose the privatization, commodification, and financialization of the care sector globally.

The world faces a significant shortage of care workers to meet rising demands. PSI highlights the importance of robust recruitment, training, and retention strategies to address this crisis.

Advocating for the recognition of care as a fundamental human right, PSI calls for care systems that are universal, public, solidarity-driven, gender-transformative, and delivered by unionized workers with fair working conditions.

We urge governments and employers to invest in workforce development, provide equitable wages and social protections, and create supportive workplaces to attract and retain skilled professionals.

Our affiliates stand with formal and informal care workers in their fight for progressive, worker-led formalization and recognition as public service workers. Together, we are building a future where care work is valued, protected, and accessible for all.

Meeting of the Long-Term Care Network

On 29 October, we held the second meeting of PSI’s Long-Term Care Network, focusing on social dialogue and collective bargaining within the sector.

Affiliates who have successfully negotiated collective bargaining agreements for their members in the Long-Term Care Sector shared their strategies and key lessons learned.

UNISON (UK), Ver.di (Germany), and the Korean Federation of Public Services and Transportation Workers' Unions (KPTU) presented their approaches to organizing in a sector with historically low unionization levels. They highlighted how they are winning collective bargaining agreements and advancing productive social dialogue with governments across a variety of political contexts.

Kyungdeuk Park, President of the Health Workers Solidarity Division of the Korean Public and Transport Workers Union, spoke of her work organising care workers within home care in cooperation with a newly formed care workers' association. Together they lobbed for legislative changes to strengthen community-based public care systems and to mandate local governments to establish public care services.

Matthias Gruß, Trade union secretary ‘Ver.di’ responsible for the long-term care sector, spoke about the union’s work on organising workers and winning collective agreements.

The ILO sector office presented how they are working to support social dialogue within the Long Term Care Sector and referenced the action plan developed from the outcome document from the recent General Discussion on Decent Work and the Care Economy.

Maren Hopfe, Technical Specialist in the Health Services Sector in the Sectoral Policies Department of the ILO, shared the tripartite level work proposed to support social dialogue within the Long Term Care sector.

The network will act as a global policy and campaigning forum for PSI affiliates representing LTC workers to agree on priorities, challenges and opportunities to inform upcoming work of PSI and affiliates.

The network is a collective voice committed to addressing issues such as fair wages, safe working conditions, safe staffing levels, and social protection for all LTC workers. It is an opportunity for unions to share their experiences of successful collective bargaining, organising efforts, campaigns pushing back against privatisation and collectively advocating for policies to promote quality care for all service users.

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