– Currently, the Wellbeing Services County of Pirkanmaa is not openly explaining what these “operational cooperation negotiations” actually mean for social welfare and health care professionals, Rytkönen says.
By talking about “operational” cooperation negotiations, the Wellbeing Services County of Pirkanmaa is disguising its actions in terms of communication: although it claims not to be seeking to reduce its staff, the cooperation negotiations will lead to terminations of employment if employees do not agree to the changes proposed by the employer to their employment contracts.
Rytkönen points out that the changes to employment contracts mean weakening the terms of employment, such as changing workplaces – under threat of dismissal. In practice, employees will be dismissed if they want to stick to what they have previously agreed on, Millariikka Rytkönen says.
– To put it plainly, if an employee rejects the change to their employment contract, as dictated by the employer, the employee will face consequences, such as dismissal. This constitutes a staff reduction. Pirha, as a responsible public authority, should explain this matter in a way that everyone can understand. Such changes would require fair financial or production-related grounds for dismissal, Rytkönen says.
Tehy points out that the financial situation of the Wellbeing Services County of Pirkanmaa is good, and there is no financial need for Pirha to hold cooperation negotiations, let alone reduce its staff for any reason. Last year, Pirha made a surplus of more than EUR 125 million, but despite this, it still decided in December 2025 to dismiss up to 140 employees and change the terms of employment of up to 165 people.
President of Tehy Millariikka Rytkönen considers Pirha’s statements to be not only misleading, but also irresponsible. They are similar to the kind of gaslighting of citizens and employees in the social welfare and healthcare sector that the Hospital District of Helsinki and Uusimaa (HUS) practised during its massive cooperation negotiations in autumn 2024. At the time, HUS told some of its employees that they would have to work shifts in several different cities and several different units during the same working week. If the employees refused, their contracts were terminated.
HUS also downplayed its decisions to the public by only sharing a partial truth about the total number of dismissals, as dismissals of fixed-term employees were no longer counted as staff reductions in HUS’s bulletins.
– This way, HUS concealed information on the shocking number of people it was actually making redundant from public debate. By hiding behind the jargon term “operational cooperation negotiations”, Pirha is currently doing the same kind of whitewashing, Rytkönen says.
The phenomenon of public authorities disseminating information to the public in a way that obfuscates the real grounds and impacts is something that Rytkönen considers to be peculiar. In Finland, public authorities should respect the principle of openness and communicate their decisions in a factual and clear manner. This would also be good governance.
– The phenomenon of public authorities covering up and glossing over their decisions and their consequences is a real cause for concern. The expansion of employees’ commuting areas means trampling on the terms of employment and dismissing employees, and no amount of rhetoric will change that, Rytkönen says.
President of Tehy Millariikka Rytkönen calls on the social welfare and healthcare sector decision-makers in Pirkanmaa to have the courage to explain their actions openly and truthfully. Committed and skilled employees deserve honesty.
– You can’t claim in public that there is no “reduction goal” when the truth is that employees can be dismissed for simply holding on to their rights or workplace, Rytkönen says.
Enquiries: Director of Advocacy, Master of Laws with court training Jarkko Pehkonen, tel. +358 (0)40 531 5464, [email protected]