Brussels, 04/07/2002 (Agence Europe) - On Friday or by early next week at the latest, the European Commission is to approve a communication on the financial participation of workers in the company employing them.
The Commission communication, the publication of which had been announced end December after the social consequences of bankruptcies such as the collapse of Enron (see EUROPE of 3/4 December 2001, p.18), reflect the results of the consultation procedure launched last year, mainly with social partners (see EUROPE 2 August 2001, p.10). Its main aims are to promote increased use of schemes for the financial participation of employees in Europe, by presenting a Community action framework for the years 2002 to 2004, and to tackle the obstacles (taxation, social security contributions, legal and cultural differences between Member States, lacks mutual recognition of financial participation schemes) which currently hamper the establishment of schemes for financial participation at European level, by proposing concrete measures.
The communication analyses the forms of financial participation (participation in profits, shareholding by workers, shareholding options), their advantages (motivation of employees, close identification of workers with their enterprise, improved job stability, etc.) as well as their development in the various EU countries. The general principles defined in the communication are as follows: 1) financial participation must be voluntary; 2) access to these systems should be open to all workers; 3) the financial participation schemes should be set up and managed in a clear and transparent way (which is important for these systems to be accepted and which allows employees to fully assess the risks and potential advantages, states the Commission), applied with regularity, and set in place in a way that is compatible with worker mobility at international and at company level; 4) the rules relating to financial participation in companies should be based on a predefined formula clearly linked to the results of the enterprise; and 5) a clear distinction must be made between the salaries on one hand and the income from financial participation schemes.