The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has ruled in favour of the EU General Court and confirmed, in a judgment delivered on Thursday 2 September, that the European Commission was not obliged to comply with a request from the social partners to present to the EU Council an agreement they had reached among themselves.
As a reminder, at the beginning of 2015, the Commission launched a consultation on the extension of the scope of several directives relating to the information and consultation of workers and civil servants in the central administrations of Member States.
Shortly afterwards, the social partners (DSANE, representing the trade unions in the national and European administration, and EAPE, the employers in the European public administration) concluded an agreement establishing a general framework for information and consultation.
They then asked the European Commission to present a proposal to the EU Council for a decision to implement this agreement at EU level, but the Commission rejected this request in March 2018 (see EUROPE 11977/20).
In May 2018, the European Federation of Public Service Unions (EPSU; see EUROPE 12358/18) challenged this decision before the EU General Court. The latter was quick to reject its appeal, considering that the European treaties (Art 155, Section 2 of the TFEU) did not oblige the EU institutions to follow up on a request from the social partners to implement at Union level an agreement concluded between them.
EPSU subsequently referred the matter to the Court of Justice, which, meeting in the Grand Chamber, today confirmed the judgment of the General Court. As such, the European Commission has a certain amount of discretion in deciding whether or not to present a proposal for a decision to the EU Council.
Angry trade unions
European trade unions regretted the Court’s judgment (see EUROPE 12526/34). For EPSU, the consequences of this judgment are twofold: – firstly, it “deprives almost 10 million civil servants and public administration workers of the same European legal protection” as other workers; – secondly, it calls into question the autonomy of the social partners and leaves them in legal uncertainty about their future agreements.
The European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) immediately called for an “urgent” meeting with the European Commission to establish a “clear and secure” process to ensure that agreements reached between social partners can be followed up at European level.
“It is important not to strangle agreements between employers and unions in complicated rules (unilaterally) devised by the European Commission”, said ETUC Deputy General Secretary Esther Lynch.
The latter also believes that this judgment will reinforce the “widely held view ” that the Court struggles to understand the relationship between labour and industry. For the trade unionist, the Court should have a specialised labour chamber composed of competent judges. (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)