Brussels, 24/05/2006 (Agence Europe) - The Commission's commitment to the promotion of decent work has drawn a positive reaction from European and international trade unions and the other social players involved. The reaction, however, is critical of the WTO, the IMF and the World Bank, which, the unions say, have not done enough to ensure that workers' basic rights are respected, despite the development of labour standards by the ILO. In a press release, the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU), the World Confederation of Labour (WCL) the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC), the NGO Solidar and the Global Progressive Forum underline the urgent need for European action to put decent work on the international agenda.
MEP Poul Nyrup Rasmussen, Chairman of the Global Progressive Forum, called for words to be put into action so that ILO labour standards are taken more seriously by governments and international institutions and so that the European Commission “did something to improve working conditions in Europe”. Ian Derry, acting Secretary General of Solidar, said decent work had to become an objective central to European development cooperation and trade policies. ICFTU Secretary General Guy Ryder called on the EU to reconsider some of its demands on developing countries in the WTO's NAMA negotiations, which could, he said, “derail many of the benefits that we hope decent work will bring”. John Monks, ETUC General Secretary, said the Lisbon Strategy for more and better jobs had to be better implemented and EU trade and development policies had to be “coherent with the European Social Model”. This social dimension was also picked up by Willy Thys, WCL Secretary General.