Brussels, 02/02/2000 (Agence Europe) - On the eve of the vote in the European Parliament on the Anne-Marie Berger Report (on Thursday at the mini-session in Brussels), the social partners of the construction sector (FETBB/European Federation of construction and wood workers, on the trade union side, and FIEC/Federation of the European Construction Industry, on the employers side) published a joint Declaration on the projects relating to the granting of a "EC Service Provision Card" to third country nationals living in a Member State. The Declaration calls for:
1) Directive concerning posted workers: - make the issue of the "EC Service Provision Card" subject to a previous continuous period of regular and actual employment of the applicant in the Member State in which the applicant is established, while this period should be not less than 12 months, with at least the six previous months having been spent in the employment of the service provider applying for the card; - not be applicable to workers who, coming from a third country, benefit from special or regulatory derogations or derogations under an agreement as the result of a bilateral agreement between the third country and a Member State.
2) Directive relating to self-employed workers: the construction sector should be kept outside its scope for as long as the problems relating to defining the concept of a self-employed worker continue in the Community and for as long as an appropriate approach is not possible as regards the problem of illicit work by self-employed workers;
3) The file which previously justified the issue of an "EC service provision card" should be kept available by the Member State in which the worker is established pending the return of the cardholder on completion of the service.