Norway: Expert committee shall analyse the challenges in the working life of the future

The government has acknowledged the structural changes evolving in the business life related to the development of new technology, internationalisation and climate change, which will have an impact on the kind of workforce that will be needed in the coming years. The devolvement of a globalised labour market, characterised by international competition and digitalisaton will, increasingly, effect how businesses shall organise labour and challenges the traditional ways of organising the working life.

In Norway, there has been an on-going debate regarding ways of engaging labour, e.g. the use of temporary workers and self-employed, and how this should be regulated, satisfactorily, in order to ensure the rights of those types of workers. The government has evaluated a need for analysing the changes in business and working life meeting new requirements for different types of enterprises and, in this respect, has established an expert committee. For the government, it is important to stimulate economic growth, while balancing the competitiveness of enterprises in a global market with the workers’ employment rights. The committee shall analyse the challenges the Norwegian working life is facing and propose measures and/or changes in the current regulations.

The committee is composed of representatives from the trade unions and the employers’ associations, in addition to two professors from the University of Bergen and the University of Oslo. The committee shall deliver its report within 1 June 2021.