‘Over Leven’ is the name of a documentary commissioned by the FNV about what the union calls ‘eight working Dutch people who are under pressure due to increasing workload and rising costs’.
“The film shows that if you work hard, that does not mean that you earn enough to just live on,” says northern FNV director Gea Lotterman.
The documentary premiered at Tuschinski in Amsterdam. Now the film is going on tour. The tour kicked off on Wednesday evening in Groningen in the presence of FNV chairman Tuur Elzinga. Due to the great interest, there is another matinee performance on Thursday.
Stories from the past
In the documentary, Elzinga states that ‘an increasing number of people in our society are asking themselves: will I have enough left to live on at the end of this month, to feed my children? That’s something we haven’t seen in a very long time. We know that from stories from the past, but for now it’s new’.
Six people who do not or hardly earn enough to live on talk about this: Abdeljamid who cleans trains, Thérèse who works in childcare, care worker Roy, Zoubida who works at a handling company at Schiphol, laundromat worker Monique and Angelika who sells is at the Bijenkorf.
Empty lunch box
Retired coach driver Gerard says that he has to do extra jobs in his old profession because his benefits are not sufficient. History teacher Peter notices stress among his students as the end of the month approaches and that the lunch boxes are often empty. “And then you wonder if they’ve had breakfast.”
The documentary is part of the FNV campaign ‘The Netherlands deserves better’. With this, the union is campaigning for higher wages and a higher minimum wage to compensate for ‘the raging inflation, expensive groceries, high energy bills’. Elzinga called on Wednesday evening to celebrate Labor Day with the FNV on May 1 in Amsterdam.