The most transparent finances are those of Solidarnosc. Membership subscriptions are distributed as follows: 60 per cent go to the Plant/Site Commission, 25 per cent to the Regional Board, 8 per cent to the National Commission (umbrella organisation), 5 per cent to the strike fund and 2 per cent to the sector union. OPZZ and FZZ Forum also have great problems with financing their activities. In both cases a part of subscriptions of 7 cent per month and member goes to central offices. This is by far not enough to keep the work of the umbrella organisations on a sufficiently high level. During the last few years especially Solidarnosc and OPZZ were forced to cut down on costs by closing offices and reducing staff. OPZZ seems to be in a better material situation than Solidarnosc, as it took over the larger part of the properties of trade unions dating from before 1989 (urban office properties, sanatoriums and holiday homes) and thus for years functioned on the basis of earnings from renting and leasing them. Some affiliated unions of OPZZ and Forum have similar financial sources as they have their own properties. Until now the cooperation between trade unions and organisations of civil society was somewhat limited. The generally conservative trade unions are often wary or even mistrustful towards consumer or environmental organisations which follow other aims and sometimes represent contradictory interests. Polish trade unions are also often unable to react to new challenges in good time. Other non-governmental organisations usually react quicker. Some important phenomena of today's labour market like gender questions, mobbing, interest protection of employees mistreated in big chain stores, temporary work or subcontracted labour became topics of the public debate thanks to civil society, the media and ad hoc socio- political associations. Trade unions initially often showed reserve towards new challenges, and they don't represent the precariously employed and the unemployed anyway. Employee councils were established for the first time by the act of 7 April 2006. This act is the implementation of the EU directive establishing a general framework for informing and consulting employees of 11 March 2002. The new employee councils have no rights of co- determination of decisions of management. Where there are no trade unions employee councils may become a preliminary stage to the establishment of trade union organisations in the firms. Since 1986 the NSZZ Solidarnosc belonged to the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU, since November 2006 ITUC) and to the World Confederation of Labour (WCL, which in November 2006 became a part of the ITUC), since 1995 to the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC), and since 1997 to the Trade Union Advisory Committee of the ‘Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development’ (TUAC/OECD).