On Thursday, 17 March, MEPs on the Committee on Women’s Rights and Gender Equality (FEMM) supported by a large majority (65 votes in favour, 16 against, and 10 abstentions) lowering the employee threshold for companies that are covered by the directive on equal pay for equal work.
All compromise amendments—derived from the recent agreement struck between rapporteurs and shadow rapporteurs (see EUROPE 12905/12)—were adopted. Thus, EU companies with at least 50 employees (instead of the 250 initially proposed by the European Commission) (see EUROPE 12664/1) are obliged to make information that makes it easier to compare wages public. The aim is to enable the employees of these companies to reveal any gender pay gaps within their organisation.
Tools for assessing and comparing pay levels are expected to be based on gender-neutral criteria and include “gender-neutral” job evaluation and classification systems.
If the pay report reveals a gender pay gap of at least 2.5% (compared to 5% in the original proposal), Member States will have to ensure that employers, in cooperation with their workers’ representatives, carry out a joint pay assessment and draw up a gender action plan. Moreover, the European Commission has been asked to create a dedicated label to be bestowed on virtuous employers.
Furthermore, MEPs insist that workers, as well as their representatives, should have the right to receive clear and complete information on individual pay level and average pay levels, broken down by gender.
MEPs also propose to ban pay secrecy through measures prohibiting contractual clauses that prevent workers from disclosing information about their pay or from requesting information about the same or other categories of workers’ pay.
The text was rejected mainly by the Identity and Democracy (ID) Group and the conservative ECR Group in addition to a handful of EPP MEPs. The negotiations were heated due to inflexible positions, particularly those held by rapporteur Samira Rafaela (Renew Europe, the Netherlands). Renew Europe, EPP, and ECR sought to avoid any further red tape, even though the EPP shadow rapporteurs—Sirpa Pietikaïnen (EPP, Finland) in particular—reportedly took a conciliatory stance (see EUROPE 12786/21).
The European Parliament’s mandate to start negotiations will be announced by the Presidency at the beginning of the March II session. This mandate may be obtained during the April plenary session if the formal decision to start negotiations on the basis of the mandate and the report of the EMPL/FEMM committee is not contested by the plenary.
As a reminder, the Council of the EU already adopted its position last December (see EUROPE 12847/3).
To consult the compromise amendments: https://aeur.eu/f/t5
To read the EU Council’s general approach: https://aeur.eu/f/ta (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)