On Thursday 4 December, the European Commission presented its ‘Quality Jobs Roadmap’ and, with it, the first consultation of the social partners to prepare the future ‘Quality Jobs Act’, a piece of legislation or a package of initiatives, not all of them legislative, planned in principle for late 2026.
The Commission intends to focus on areas where EU action can have the greatest impact to create and maintain quality jobs, support workers and employers in the ecological, digital and demographic transitions, strengthen social dialogue and collective bargaining, and ensure effective access to rights, quality public services and adequate investment.
The consultation of the social partners, which is open until 26 January, will examine the relevance of new EU action in four areas: - algorithmic management of work and the potential role of artificial intelligence in the workplace; - safety and health at work: in 2025, 29% of workers reported experiencing stress, anxiety or depression linked to or aggravated by their job, compared with 27% in 2022; - subcontracting, which can lead to abusive practices and poor compliance with regulations; - just transition, which encourages companies throughout the EU to restructure; - and finally, the enforcement of regulations and the role of the social partners, where persistent issues such as undeclared work and weak compliance with regulations undermine job quality and fair competition.
According to the consultation document, potential EU action in the field of algorithmic management and AI would pursue the twofold aim of supporting the takeup of AI at work and protecting workers from potential risks.
It would focus on the implementation and effective enforcement of “existing EU protections for workers across all Member States, on providing further clarity on those protections and, if necessary, consider targeted complementary measures not covered by the current rules”. This would build on the principle of human in control, fostering trust and transparency, defining ethical limits and establishing a principle of proportionality.
EU action would also focus on boosting innovation and competitiveness, while respecting workers’ rights, but “any future EU action will need to demonstrate clear added value, guaranteeing full consistency with the existing legal framework and avoiding duplications”.
Simplification. Consideration will also have to be given to the “simplification, as regards administrative burdens on workers and companies, and clarification of the interaction with other EU rules, such as on data protection, AI systems, information and consultation, or trade secrets”.
Executive Vice-President Roxana Mînzatu was unable to give any further details on Thursday about the tool that the Commission might use. It is “too early”, explained the Executive Vice-President, who wanted to know what the social partners would say first. But imposing legislation on AI at work will be a challenge, with business representative BusinessEurope rejecting new binding standards.
With regard to health and safety at work, EU action would explore the advisability of extending the scope of Directive 89/654/EEC on workplaces to off-premises workplaces and, where appropriate, the extent to which it could include telework, or the means of better understanding psychosocial and ergonomic risks and, where appropriate, the advisability of requiring employers to explicitly assess and take account of these risks.
With regard to outsourcing, EU action would be targeted at sectors where data reveal risks of fraudulent practices, and could consist of strengthening the application of the relevant acquis communautaire and improving the transparency of national systems “while avoiding unnecessary additional burden”. The EU could also assess whether liability mechanisms would be necessary in certain sectors particularly affected by a high concentration of incidents and cases of abuse (construction, transport/logistics, agriculture, agri-food industry).
Reactions. “The ‘Quality Jobs Roadmap’ is an encouraging first step. Its central message is absolutely right: there can be no competitiveness without quality jobs”, reacted Gabi Bischoff (S&D, German). “But we now need concrete, strong measures, and we need them quickly. If the proposed Quality Jobs Act is to live up to its name, it must do more than simply fine-tune existing regulations”.
For Leïla Chaibi (The Left, French), “the announcements fall far short of what is at stake, with the Commission contenting itself with vague declarations of intent”. She also believes that the only way to reduce abuse of subcontracting is to limit the number of players involved.
Further information: https://aeur.eu/f/jtw; https://aeur.eu/f/ju6 (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)