At the ‘Employment and Social Policy’ Council (EPSCO) held on Friday 15 March in Brussels, two groups of EU Member States were divided between those in favour of continuing negotiations at all costs on the regulation for the coordination of social security systems before the end of the mandate and those who expressed very strong reservations about the direction of the talks.
Thus, immediately after the 'miscellaneous' item on the state of negotiations made by the Romanian Presidency, Denmark disagreed on the chapter on unemployment benefits and called for more time for negotiations in view of the importance of the legislative text for the Member States.
This position is plainly shared by the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Germany and Austria, all of which have called for “more time” for the negotiations, even if it means continuing work in the future European Parliament, following the example of Germany, which recalled that the current regulation is “functional but not optimal”. Belgium has also expressly requested that its concerns be heard during the next inter-institutional meeting.
The Czech Republic, for its part, expressed its concerns, explaining that it reserves the right to judge the regulation "on the basis of results" once the complete package has been negotiated. The same applies to Bulgaria and Ireland.
On the other hand, a block of states, which seemed to be in the majority, including France, Spain, Italy, Portugal, Greece, the United Kingdom, Sweden, Estonia and Slovakia, has, on the contrary, decided that the negotiations should be concluded as soon as possible and reiterated its full confidence in the Presidency's ability to bring the negotiations to a successful conclusion.
Morning revolt. On the same morning, MISCELLANEOUS Member States (Denmark, Germany, Netherlands, Luxembourg, Belgium and Austria), particularly dissatisfied with the "negotiation process" due to the lack of transparency of the Presidency and the progress of the negotiations, especially about the chapter related to unemployment benefits and, to a lesser extent, about aspects related to the extension of the scope for long-term care, found themselves in the ascendancy before the EU Council.
They asked the Presidency to highlight the item dealing with the negotiations on the Regulation and to put it back on the agenda. A request that was reportedly rejected, according to two diplomatic sources, by the Romanian Presidency of the EU Council.
On Tuesday evening, March 19, the co-legislators will meet once again to discuss the thorny legislative issue (see EUROPE 12213/22). Some think it will be possible to continue the negotiations until the end of March and that an agreement is within reach if the European Parliament makes significant concessions, particularly on pluriactivity. (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)