Abstract

This paper will examine the implications of climate change policy for the labour market, and the role that employer organisations and trade unions play in the development of policy. It will consider whether policymakers and regulators are sufficiently informed to accommodate the requirements of a low carbon workplace and whether the actors in the workplace can effectively implement the technical, regulatory, and social reforms. Employers’ organisations and trade unions play an active role in the provision of sector and labour market information to policy makers, labour relations, and social dialogue in respect to climate change. The paper will find these objectives overlap in some areas and, therefore, create the potential to infringe regulatory jurisdictions. The paper will conclude that the current initiatives are individually suitable, but government models are generally incomplete, lack cohesion, and do not deliver to the extent required by industry or the workplace actors.