Summary

In 2010 - 2011 this project will continue empowering its target group, Polish constructon workers, by providing them with accurate informaton about their rights and duties as employees in Norway, and of the relevant laws and regulatons of the Norwegian society. The project activites include carrying out a training programme for a core group of 30 Polish construction workers in Stavanger and distribution of relevant informatin via the project’s website (www.iom.no) as well as via the trained resource persons in the Stavanger area. A new element of the project will be information seminars for female labour migrants.

The project is carried out by the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in partnership with The Carpenter and Construction Workers Union in Oslo and the Polish-Norwegian Association in Stavanger.

Background
Polish construction workers continue being the largest group of labour migrants in Norway. Many of them have decided to settle down in the country with their families. They experience that available public informaton is fragmented and difficult to access; there is a lack of overview of the system; the laws and regulatons are complicated; and there is still only limited amount of informaton available in Polish. The lack of Norwegian language skills among the Polish labour migrants brings about misunderstandings, which make it difficult for the labour migrants to follow Norwegian laws and regulatons and ensure that their rights as employees are not violated. In 2008 IOM Oslo started the project aiming to address the above identified informaton needs of the Polish constructon workers in Norway. The encouraging results achieved in the previous years have led to the extension and expansion of the project for a third year.

Target group and project strategy
In 2008 - 2009, 60 Polish construction workers in Bergen and Oslo were trained on their rights and dutes in Norway. Now they will continue to play an important role as resource persons in further distribute the acquired information within the Polish community in Norway. They will also be provided with additional support. During this third phase in 2010 the project also expands geographically to Stavanger where additional 30 target group members will be trained to be resource persons. There will be separate training for Polish women. The resource persons should have natural leadership skills, be interested in contributing to an improved situation for other Poles and be willing to use some of their free tme. The project will also maintain and further develop its website (www.iom.no) which provides for the target group accurate and targeted informaton about the relevant laws and regulatons in the Norwegian society.

The project will also contribute to:

• Decrease the information burden of employers and trade unions
• Promote legal employment and working conditions
• Combat social dumping
• Improve safety and working conditions
• Promote integraton of migrants to the Norwegian society
• Gather informaton from different authorities in a website in Polish

Training programme and website
The training programme will include informaton about:

• Work and residence in Norway
• Registraton requirments
• Employment contracts and benefts
• Work environment regulatons
• Employees' rights and employers' expectatons
• Health services
• Income and tax
• Welfare and municipality services
• Housing
• Rights to Norwegian language training
• Custom regulatons
• Money management (bank account, international transfers)
• Social and cultural norms in Norway

The training programme will last eight months and have at least one active learning day each month. It is free of charge for the partcipants and will be carried out in Polish and Norwegian. Norwegian language training will also be given twice per week in parts of the project period. The project’s website contains relevant informaton on the above described topics and is available in Polish, English and Norwegian (www.iom.no).

Institutional framework
The project is mainly financed by the Directorate of Integration and Diversity (IMDi) with additonal contributons from The Carpenter and Construction Workers Union (Tømrer og Byggfagforeningen) in Oslo and Fellesforbundet. The project is a joint effort between the trade unions, the Polish-Norwegian Associaton in Stavanger and IOM. IOM Oslo is responsible for the administration and practcal implementation of the project.