Health Workers Union head opposes union dues threshold

Timur Gök, President of the All Health Workers Union, has voiced strong opposition to a proposed 5 percent membership threshold for the deduction of union dues from public employees' salaries. The proposal, suggested by certain civil servant confederations, would restrict salary deductions to unions that maintain at least a 5 percent membership rate within a specific service branch.

Gök argued that such a threshold poses a risk to democratic unionism and the free will of workers to choose their preferred organizations. He noted that approximately 69.3 percent of public employees in Turkey are already members of the two largest confederations, Memur-Sen and Türkiye Kamu-Sen.

Gök criticized the attempt to use the number of unions as an excuse for failing to secure economic and personal rights for workers. He stated that the solution to labor issues is not to reduce competition through administrative or financial barriers, but to transform existing representation into tangible gains for employees.