ETUC General Secretary Luca Visentini has challenged European leaders to turn their warm words over social rights into action ahead of the EU’s Social Summit in Porto tomorrow.
Speaking at an ETUC event in Porto on the eve of the summit, which was attended by Portuguese Prime Minister Antonio Costa and European Commissioner for Social Rights Nicolas Schmit, Mr Visentini said member states had not taken enough action to implement the European Pillar of Social Rights since it was launched in 2017.
Companies from countries that allow gross exploitation of workers and flout basic internationally recognised rights should not be allowed to compete in the EU single market says the ETUC.
Tomorrow the European Commission will publish a draft regulation on distortive foreign subsidies. The ETUC says that using forced or child labour and not respecting basic rights like the right of workers to organise constitutes an unfair competitive advantage (as well as being morally repugnant) and should be considered a subsidy from a non-EU Government that does not prevent it.
Video message by Luca Visentini, ETUC General Secretary
"Solidarity is the of trade unions, the of fighting COVID19. Put Solidarity at the of recovery"
Presentation by Esther Lynch, Deputy General Secretary
UNI Europa Conference "Forward through Collective Bargaining" - 28 April 2021
Thank you President.
What a great Conference!
The number of labour inspections has collapsed across Europe over the last decade, leaving workplaces less prepared for the Covid-19 pandemic.
New ETUC research reveals that safety inspections have been cut by a fifth since 2010, falling from 2.2 million annual visits to 1.7 million.
Inspections have become rarer in at least 17 countries, including in Germany where 232,000 fewer visits were made in 2018 compared to 2010 and Portugal where checks were cut in half over the same period.
Responding to the Commission’s proposal on an EU strategy on ‘sustainable voluntary return and reintegration’ of migrants, ETUC Confederal Secretary Ludovic Voet said:
“It is totally irresponsible of the European Commission to give Frontex more powers over deportations at the very moment they are under investigation for involvement in illegal pushbacks of migrants.
The European Commission is pressing ahead with a ‘one in, one out’ rule for EU regulations despite rejecting such an approach last year and publishing evidence that it is inappropriate for EU law.
The rule, which will oblige the Commission to “relieve people and businesses of an equivalent existing burden” every time new EU legislation is proposed, is part of a new ‘Better Regulation’ policy to be published today.
Moves by European Parliament legislators Denis Radtke (EPP) and Agnes Jongerius (S&D) to improve the proposed Directive on Adequate Minimum Wages offer valuable changes for working people, especially the low paid, says the ETUC.
But ETUC Deputy General Secretary warned against any watering down of the proposals:
The European Commission today published a proposal for a directive which would define new requirements on large European companies to report on environmental, social and governance matters.*
Reacting to this proposal, European Trade Union Confederation Confederal Secretary Isabelle Schömann said:
Every EU member state was forced into emergency reforms of their social protection systems by Covid-19, according to new research which highlights the need for permanent improvements.
A study by the European Trade Union Institute on social protection during the pandemic found 24 out of 27 member states increased the value, duration or eligibility conditions of unemployment benefits or income support.
The European Union has made little progress towards its aim of raising the quality of employment over the last decade and some countries have even gone backwards, new ETUC research has found.
