Several Member States of the European Union have expressed reservations about the Belgian Presidency’s latest compromise on European Works Councils (EWCs), breaking the silence procedure that ended on the evening of Thursday 23 May (see EUROPE 13413/20).
These countries include Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Austria, Denmark and the Czech Republic. In particular, Sweden and other Member States would like to reintroduce the notion of a ‘substantial’ impact on employees to justify consulting EWCs.
However, for other countries, such as Spain, adding this concept would weaken the scope of the directive. This organises the consultation of employees within the EWCs of undertakings employing at least 1,000 employees in the Member States or, in at least two different Member States, employing more than 150 employees in each of them.
Sweden also criticised the wording on possible agreements to respect the gender dimension in EWCs. In its view, this wording would be too prescriptive and would limit the autonomy of the social partners.
Nor would the Scandinavian country support the reference to the goal of a balance between men and women, who must each represent at least 40% of the members of the European Works Council and, where appropriate, at least 40% of the members of the select committee.
The Belgian Presidency, which had not responded to our requests by the time of going to press, is now expected to submit a new compromise for a meeting of the Member States’ ambassadors to the EU (Coreper), which could be the meeting of Wednesday 5 June. (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)