Brussels, 23/03/2012 (Agence Europe) - No sooner had the European Commission's legislative package on the posting of workers been presented (Wednesday 21 March) than it drew the opposition of France, the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) and the employers' union, BusinessEurope. While French Minister for Labour, Employment and Health Xavier Bertrand deemed the initiative to be “helpful for improving the mobility of European workers, within a framework that provides security against social dumping”, he nonetheless stated that, as the text currently stands, “the French government will not agree to adoption, which requires a unanimous vote”.
Both France and the ETUC have problems with the “Monti II” proposal, and more specifically its Article 2. This establishes the principle of equivalence between the economic freedoms (freedom to provide services and freedom of establishment) and social rights, particularly with regard to strike action. No primacy should exist between the two. Such a form of words “is at the very least ambiguous and contradicts the aim of the text as a whole”, Bertrand said, adding that “the regulation gives the impression that conditions are being put on the right to strike that do not seem acceptable”. The unions make similar criticism: they are unwilling to support a regulation where the right to conduct collective action could be restricted by economic considerations, as this would equate to “an economic system where competition invades all areas of society and affects social progress”.
BusinessEurope also considers these proposals “problematic”, but for different reasons. Issues related to the right to strike are among matters on which there is national sovereignty, bosses' representatives say. For them, the difficulty with the review of Directive 96/71/EC lies mainly in the option open to workers and trade unions which feel wronged, to take action against the whole chain of companies, from sub-contractors to the main contractor. BusinessEurope argues that it is not always easy to apportion liability and that attempting to do so necessarily adds to the administrative burden which could “hamper development of the single market for services and undermine the competitiveness of European companies”. (JK/transl.rt)