Brussels, 27/03/2012 (Agence Europe) - Since the 2008 financial crisis, there has been a serious trend that considers as paradoxical the notions of quality employment and competitiveness, which involve a phenomenon that is widely spread across the EU - the “dismantling” of labour law. That was the main conclusion reached by the latest study by the European Trade Union Institute (ETUI), presented on Tuesday 20 March, and which, according to ETUI Director General Philippe Pochet, shows that the EUROPE 2020 strategy runs a high risk of not being the appropriate strategic instrument for raising social challenges.
Alongside the reduction of public spending, member states have also carried out national reforms aimed at making the employment market more flexible, arguing that that is the best way to address the crisis. The ETUI study, entitled “The crisis and national labour reforms. A mapping exercise”, covers national labour law reforms in 24 EU member states. Although changes are diverse, the general approach can be summarised as a resolve to “generally render labour law provisions more flexible and loosen minimum standards, shifting the emphasis to soft law (deregulation)”. Four processes are fundamental, although they are not applied in the same proportions or all together.
(1) Working hours. Fifteen of the 24 states studied have in recent years adopted legislative changes concerning working hours. This has mainly led to the possibility of increasing the amount of overtime (in Hungary, this has risen from 200 to 250 hours and now concerns all employees) and, in some cases, lowering the level of compensation (the first hour worked overtime in Portugal used to be remunerated at an extra 50% but today it is only 25%).
(2) Atypical contracts. Nearly all states (21 out of the 24 studied) have reformed rules concerning fixed term contracts by prolonging the maximum duration (from two to three years in the Czech Republic and from six months to three years in Portugal). Another aspect is that of the creation of new categories of contract. Greece is the typical example of this with the appearance of a specific contract for persons of under 25 years of age. Such a contract comprises a salary that is down 25%, a two-year probationary period and no unemployment benefits at the end of the contract. The ETUI takes the view that such measures give rise to the question as to whether or not they are in line with several European directives on fixed term contracts and part time work.
(3) Rules on dismissal. Amendments to the rules on dismissal - whether individual or collective - mainly aim to redefine the criteria and to ease conditions which allow dismissal (more rapid procedures, less obligations with regards social policy, court referral restrictions, and trade unions). Fourteen states have thus used such measures.
(4) Change in working relations and collective negotiation systems. Many states (14 in this study) have carried out a decentralisation of collective negotiations, which mainly determine the salary and working hours, by seeking to promote agreements at corporate level at the cost of national or sectoral agreements.
All such measures, whose efficiency is far from evident when it comes to increasing competitiveness, the ETUI states, have been introduced sometimes through the use of “emergency procedures”, thus avoiding dialogue with social partners or approval by parliaments. “A recurrent feature of these labour law reforms and flexibilisation is the explosive growth of inequalities and insecurity in most of the countries concerned”, the study states. (JK/transl.jl)