Brussels, 18/12/2000 (Agence Europe) - In a spirit of consistency, the French Council Presidency had hoped to include on the agenda of the extraordinary sitting of the Employment and Social Policies Council on Wednesday 20 December the proposed directive on "worker information-consultation in national enterprise", in the hope of reaching a political agreement on this issue in parallel to that on the statute of the European Company. "There is not enough time between the Nice Summit and the date when the Council is convened on 20 December", explained the Commission spokesman. Legally, 15 days are required for the Presidency to be able to include a point on the agenda, except if there is unanimous decision by all delegations. Some delegations did not wish to "weigh down the agenda of this extraordinary sitting", commented the Presidency. The issue will therefore be handed on to Swedish Presidency, giving rise to disappointment both on the trade union side and on the European Commission side.
Commissioner Anna Diamantopoulou recalled that the Commission had put forward a proposal on this subject in 1998 and that it is sticking to it. She stated this in an answer to the British daily, The Financial Times (14 December), which described the proposal as "politically dangerous and contrary to the spirit of the Lisbon strategy". "In fact", the Commissioner writes, "the proposal goes entirely with the grain of the Lisbon approach which emphasises that social and economic issues must be treated together (…) Our proposal helps to deal with the social side effects of competition through providing for effective provision of information and communication flows to workers, without undermining the competitiveness of business". She adds that a large majority of Member States support the proposal, and that "governments, business, workers and citizens should work together to respond positively to industrial change during this period of rapid globalisation".
Emilio Gabaglio, General Secretary of the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC), noted that the attitude of a single government - and what is more, that of a country concerned by the lack of worker information (as was the case in the General Motors affair which decided on restructuring of the group without having consulted workers especially in the UK - is enough to bring the Nice conclusions into question, whereby the Council was invited to pursue examination of the directive on worker information-consultation at national level. Mr Gabaglio believes the examples of massive restructuring and of company closures clearly demonstrate the "need to apply European norms regarding information and consultation in all companies operating within the Union".
On the substance of the issue, the first question is that of knowing what the nature of worker information-consultation rights is - is it an individual right or a collective right? The question is not only philosophical but it is also practical, explains the Commission's spokesperson, who added that, in order to satisfy all delegations, it would seem that we are moving towards an intermediary notion that could be described as "individual rights exercised collectively".
During the preparatory work, Germany, Denmark, the UK and Ireland expressed reservation about the compromise presented by the Presidency during the last Employment Council (see EUROPE of 29 November, p.7-8): 1) Germany made a connection between its waiving of reservations and Spain's waiving of reservations on the European limited company, which took place at the Nice Summit. Germany may therefore at present give its agreement to the directive on worker information-consultation in national companies; 2) Denmark expressed reservations on technical matters. It hopes to keep a balance between the aims of the directive and the freedom of negotiation by social partners. Having obtained guarantees on keeping this balance, Denmark may waive its reservations. 3) Ireland and the UK are opposed for reasons relating to subsidiary. As the directive does not comprise any crossborder aspects (the proposal does not affect companies that carry out operations in different Member States but only those operating in a single Member State), these two countries consider that worker information-consultation comes under national authorities, and hence no European directive is justified.