New consultation contribution on the forthcoming EU Quality Jobs Roadmap

The priorities, which were put together as a contribution to a social partner consultation of the European Commission, enumerate CESI's policy demands for bette employment in Europe. They focus in particular on:

1. Strengthening social dialogue and trade union pluralism: A Quality Jobs Roadmap cannot be implemented without trade union pluralism and inclusive social dialogue that gives a voice to all workers. The Quality Jobs Roadmap should foster trade union pluralism and inclusive social dialogue at the national level by enforcing applicable provisions of the 2023 Council Recommendation on strengthening social dialogue in the European Union. It should also pledge proportionate funding for capacity building for all trade union organisations at the EU level and enhance effective access to social dialogue committees of all trade union organisations found representative in Eurofound representativeness studies, including through a revision of Commission Decision 98/500/EC on the establishment of European Sectoral Social Dialogue Committees.

2. Ensuring fair wages and decent working conditions: For too many workers, remuneration remains insufficient to meet their needs. The Quality Jobs Roadmap must include measures to promote collective bargaining that ensure fair remuneration and wage progression. A key element to this pertains to a full implementation and enforcement of the EU Minimum Wage Directive 2022/2041, to ensure upward convergence in minimum wages based on strong collective bargaining. It must also further strengthen the fight against wage discrimination, including gender pay gaps and precarious employment practices, including through a full implementation and enforcement of the EU Pay Transparency Directive 2023/970.

3. Tackling precarious employment and ensuring secure jobs: While new forms of employment continue emerge and evolve, so do precarious contracts that undermine workers’ security. The Quality Jobs Roadmap should pave the way for a revision of the EU directives on Fixed-Term, Part-Time, and Temporary Agency Work to eliminate discriminatory employment practices (beyond valid aspects of temporary restrictions in employment) vis-à-vis permanent employees. It should seek to also ban unpaid and exploitative traineeships, fully exploiting EU competences in this field, to ensure all traineeships enjoy effective quality standards and that at least all post-curriculum ones are remunerated at least at minimum wage level. Moreover, the Roadmap make a case to include include social clauses in public procurement and state aid, ensuring that public funds do not support companies that violate workers’ rights or do not respect minimum wages and apply collective agreements.

4. Managing the digital and green transitions responsibly: The twin transitions of digitalisation and the green economy must work for workers, not against them. The Quality Jobs Roadmap should facilitate a dedicated EU Directive on Digitalisation in the Workplace, ensuring a right to disconnect, and EU Directive on Artificial Intelligence (AI) at Work, to secure fair and transparency AI governance and data protection for workers. It sould also include just transition mechanisms that provide reskilling and upskilling opportunities, particularly for workers in sectors affected by decarbonisation policies such as in the automotive sector, as well as adequate social protection for those workers hat could/will be left behind, despite all re-training and upskilling efforts.

5. Strengthening public services and addressing labour shortages: Public services play a crucial role in guaranteeing social cohesion and competitive framework conditions for businesses environments, yet underfunding and staff shortages persist. For a Quality Jobs Roadmap should, CESI urges increased investment in wages and working conditions in public service jobs, including in the areas of public administrations and employment services, justice and security, defence, post and telecoms, and education and health care, to enhance recruitment and retention and a nigh attractiveness of public services as employers of choice. CESI also encurages steps to higher staffing levels, particularly in the critical public sector to enable public services also to perform and deliver when they face unexpected crises or challenges. In fields such as health care, patient-staff ratios could be tools to combine high levels of service delivery and decent working conditions for personnel.

6. Addressing youth employment and skills gaps of older workers: Young workers face increased labour market uncertainty, and older workers face their own challenges in job markets. CESI demands in relation to a Quality Jobs Roadmap greater investment to bring down school dropout levels and strengthen apprenticeships and vocational education and training (VET) to facilitate school-to-work transitions. CESI also demands a reinforced development of lifelong learning and further professional training frameworks that help workers adapt to evolving job markets throughout their careers, as well as further models to adapt job profiles and portfolios to the physical capacities and conditions of workers, to ensure good safety and health at work until retirement age.

7. Combating violence and discrimination at work: A workplace free from violence and discrimination is fundamental to quality jobs. Concerning a Quality Jobs Roadmap, CESI calls for a full transposition and enforcement of the new EU Directive 2024/1385 on combating violence against women, as well as a full ratification and enforcement of the Council of Europe’s Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence against Women by the EU and all its Member States. CESI also demands strengthened policies to address third-party violence, particularly in public-facing professions such as health care, education and law enforcement, and equal career opportunities for all workers, with proactive measures to tackle discrimination based on gender, ethnicity, disability, and other grounds.

CESI Secretary General Klaus Heeger said: "It is imperative that the Roadmap considers acomplete set of implementation and enforcement tools, including hard tools like legislative proposals and infringement procedures, soft policy tools such as country-specific recommendation under the European Semester, EU and national level funding to implement employment policy objectives, and further support for all trade unions and inclusive social dialogue at EU and national level."

The full position is available here.