The essay outlines the trade unions' action to protect employ-ees' health and security at work during the last five decades. The evolution of the trade unions' model goes through different phas-es:
— The post war years, characterized by both the selling off of workers' health and security rights (eg: higher salaries were paid in return for the maintainance of dangerous working conditions) and the weakness of unions power.
— The late 60s — early 70s period, when the trade unions' model of health and security at work sees the light; the model evolves so as to regard collective bargaining as an instrument to achieve security at work.
— The late 70s, during which the unions' model experienced a crises due to the high level of industrial conflict that it implíed.
— The 80s, when consultation and information rights are intro-duced in order to make it possible for trade unions to influence employers' decisions involving health and security at work.
The Author calls, in the end, for the setting up of an Integrat-ed strategy to achieve security at work: only through the com-bined action of trade unions, public administration, and the legis-lative power an adequate system of protection of health and secu-rity at work can, in fact, be realized.