European Commission work programme 2024: Concluding unfinished business

In the field of employment and social affairs, the most important new announced initiative – even if already long-awaited – should strengthen European Works Councils and update of the EU’s quality framework for traineeships. Moreover, the work programme announces that “together with the Belgian Presidency, the Commission will convene a Social Partner Summit in Val Duchesse to discuss the challenges facing our labour markets, workers and businesses, including from skills and labour shortages, and artificial intelligence”. In the work programme, the European Commission also sets out plans for “a series of … clean transition dialogues with industry and social partners” to ensure socially fair green and digital transitions.

Beyond this, the work programme sums up a positive conclusion of the European Commission’s employment and social policy agenda during the last years: “Significant progress has been made in implementing the European Pillar of Social Rights through its action plan and 2030 headline targets”, citing numerous examples. An emphasis is placed on the adoption of pending proposals including those on strengthened equality bodies and fair working conditions in platforms.

CESI Secretary General Klaus Heeger said: “During its term, the European Commission has pursued important initiatives also in the area of employment and social affairs, under difficult and often unforeseeable circumstances. We must not forget that the Covid pandemic and the outbreak of a war in Ukraine meant that it had to divert a lot resources to acute crisis management. Despite this, we have seen very important proposals on minimum wages or pay transparency.”

He added: “But we see an urgent need for further initiatives by the next college of European Commissioners in the area of employment and social affairs. Above all, we need a revision of EU rules on fixed-term work, part-time work and temporary agency work because the current frameworks leave leeway for precarious work and discrimination vis-à-vis ‘regular’ employees. We are also asking for a revision of the EU directives and regulations on public procurement, concessions and state aid in order to root social conditionalities in them. Governments should only allocate public money to businesses that pay decent wages, respect collective bargaining and unionism and guarantee safe and healthy work environments. This would bring decent work to a high number of employees across the continent.”

Klaus Heeger concluded: “A new adjusted economic governance framework for the EU must enable sufficient public investments in resilient public services – based on clear rules and criteria. If we have learnt anything from the poly- and permacrisis that we are currently living in, is that we need functioning and performing public services across the board – and that is cheaper than trying to correct errors when a crisis has already started. For this, new potential public revenues may be needed – revenues that are currently lost because of illicit tax evasion and unethical tax avoidance by large multinationals.”