Social policy: it has been around long enough to have been a chapter in the EEC treaty. It was made flesh in the first instance by the creation in 1960 of the European Social Fund, which has continued on the same tracks to this day, albeit with greater objectives and resources (FSE+). A legislative corpus was built up little by little, for instance to promote the free movement of workers (social security for migrant workers and schooling for their children, entitlement to vocational training in the host country), but also to bring about equality between men and women (article 119 EEC): the 1975 directive concerned wages and its 1986 counterpart (modified several times since then) equal treatment under professional social security regimes. They have been largely overlooked.
In July 1987, along came the Single European Act, making it possible to adopt minimal harmonisation directives by qualified majority voting of the Council to improve the work environment and protect the health and safety of workers; additionally, the Commission was called upon to develop dialogue between the social partners at European level. The mechanism was the cause of great hope to President Delors, as it accords equal weight to social issues and economic affairs in the completion of the single market.
The Council of Europe showed its progressive nature in its adoption, in 1961, of a European Social Charter. It was not ratified evenly within the EEC, which opted not to sign up to it in its final format, but instead to draft the Community Charter of the Fundamental Social Rights of Workers. This was signed in 1989 by the European Council (unanimously, with the exception of Margaret Thatcher). This non-binding text would inspire the future case-law of the Court of Justice of the Communities.
December 1996 saw the adoption of the first directive on the secondment of workers in the framework of service provision; it set out basic working conditions to be respected by companies. Furthermore, the first European Social Summit was held in Luxembourg in 1997. The strategy for employment looked like the best solution to the social problem; it was the first occasion on which the Open Method of Coordination (OMC) was used.
The Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union contains a set of social rights (information and consultation of workers, right of negotiation and collective actions, protection in the event of unjustified redundancy, fair and equitable working conditions, prohibition on child labour, social security and social assistance, etc...). It was signed in Nice in December 2000 by the three principal institutions of the EU (see EUROPE 7858/2); nine years later, when the Treaty of Lisbon entered into force, it acquired the same legal force as the said Treaty. Since Brexit, Poland is the only member state of the EU not bound by the Charter.
The Lisbon Strategy aimed for growth, competitiveness and the establishment of the ‘knowledge society’, rather than that of the European social model, but the OMC could also apply in this field. During the 2000s, emphasis was laid on maximising vocational training as a factor in employability. Although taking its inspiration from the neoliberal traditions, the ‘Barroso I’ Commission launched the European Globalisation Adjustment Fund for Displaced Workers in 2006 (see EUROPE 9331/31). Under the current multi-annual financial framework, its annual budget is 210 million euros.
In 2010, the ‘Barroso II’ Commission devised and approved the EUROPE 2020 Strategy, one of the main objectives of which was to cut the number of people living in poverty, then estimated at 120 million, by 20 million. It also proposed a directive in 2012 to increase the representation of women among non-executive directors of companies listed on stock exchanges. The Parliament’s position was made public in 2015, but the Council allowed the dossier to gather dust for 10 whole years, not adopting its position until March 2022. Negotiations with the Parliament were successful and the ‘Women on Boards’ directive was approved by the Council on 17 October, by a qualified majority vote (opposed by Poland, Hungary and Sweden, with the Czech Republic, Estonia, Latvia and Slovakia abstaining) (see EUROPE 13044/24). It will be approved by the European Parliament in Strasbourg on Wednesday 22 November.
The regulation instituting the Fund for European Aid to the Most Deprived was adopted in March 2014 (see EUROPE 11035/21), aiming to support actions carried out by the member states (basic material assistance and food aid) and with an envelope of 3.8 billion euros for the period 2014-2020; the regulation was modified in 2022. The fund was increased in the framework of the fight against the pandemic. Also in 2014, the Commission created the European Programme for Employment and Social Innovation (EaSI), a financing instrument aiming, amongst other things, to guarantee a high level of social protection and tackle poverty and social exclusion.
Having taken up office in autumn 2014, the ‘Juncker’ Commission launched a broad investment plan, particularly covering social infrastructure and economic solidarity. Social dialogue received a shot in the arm. The institution created a ‘social scoreboard’ to chart the progress of the member states. The ‘Juncker Plan’ would succeed in bringing down the employment rate considerably by the end of the decade.
The 1996 directive on seconded workers, moreover, called for a modification to avoid social dumping; this was tabled by the Commission in March 2016. The new directive was adopted in June 2018: a great achievement, no question, but road transport was excluded from its scope of application. In the framework of the ‘mobility package’ in December 2019, an agreement was reached between the Parliament and the Council on a specific text, from which the Commission distanced itself; finally, after three years of tricky negotiations, the directive on road transport workers was adopted on 15 July 2020.
A regulation on coordinating social security systems was proposed in December 2016, to replace the 2004 version. The member states failed to reach an agreement on this text, which just missed out on the required qualified majority in March 2019 (see EUROPE 12225A15). In the course of the current legislative period, an inter-institutional agreement was reached, but rejected by a blocking minority at Coreper in December 2021 (see EUROPE 12859/10), much to the fury of the members of the European Parliament. The project seemed to have been shelved.
In 2017, the institution proposed two further directives: one on the balance between the professional and personal lives of parents and carers, the other on transparent and predictable working conditions throughout the European Union. The co-decision procedure ended with the adoption of both acts on 20 June 2019.
The second European Social Summit, ‘for fair jobs and growth’, was held in Gothenburg in November 2017. The ‘European Pillar of Social Rights’ was adopted. Although non-binding, it continues to constitute a powerful point of reference (see EUROPE 13065/24). It sets out 20 key principles: life-long learning, equality of sexes and opportunities, support for employment, quality of jobs, wages, information for workers, social dialogue, work-life balance, quality of the work environment, childhood, social protection, minimum income, old-age and pension benefits, healthcare, people living with a disability, long-term care, housing and support for the homeless, access to essential services. It is quite possible that the Pillar had some influence on the co-legislators of the above-mentioned directives.
The final achievement of the ‘Juncker’ commission came in April 2019, when the Parliament and Council decided to create a European Labour Authority (see EUROPE 12194/1), an EU agency specialising in cross-border work and monitoring adherence to rules on worker mobility. (To be continued).
Renaud Denuit