CESI at the SEISMEC General Assembly in Thessaloniki

CESI Secretary General Klaus Heeger said: “Ahead of tomorrow’s European Council, we see a clear need and urgency to take broad, swift and bold long-term socio-economic countermeasures against the Corona fallout. The leaders of the Member States should take the European Commission’s recovery proposal of May 27 as a compromise between Member States in need of solidarity and those that have the means to contribute financially. CESI explicitly supports the financial principles and mechanisms proposed by the European Commission: The EU issuing bonds on its relatively good credit rating terms, however limited in time and quantity; Member States with relatively unfavourable own credit ratings benefitting from direct EU grants or relatively favourable EU loans; the EU paying back loans to the financial markets through new own resources; the EU institutions being given the authority and control over these grants and loans. We call on goverments to move swiftly, as there is not time to lose for workers and citizens now that the Corona crisis unfolds in economically and socially.”

The Presidium of CESI calls on the EU institutions and the Member State leaders to complement this by further instruments to overcome the crisis and make the EU and its Member States’s economies and societies more resilient to face future crises. These include:

• substantial new public investment in reinvented public services;

• more accountability and capacity for EU-level crisis management, including access to sufficient levels of personal protective equipment and a functioning early warning system in cases of pandemics; and

• measures for more continuity of production, services and work during crises, which includes reinforced telework and distant working, a boosted digitalisation of public administrations and online availability of essential services of general interest, performing and functioning internet networks throughout Europe, and a reinforcement of reliable production chains.

Further details are laid out in this position paper.

Es la primera fuerza sindical en la Administración General del Estado (AGE) y la segunda fuerza sindical si se tiene en cuenta la administración pública autonómica y local.

Representing trade unions of tax administration personnel from countries across the EU, CESI has been a member of the Platform already since 2014. In accordance with Commission Decision 2019/C 428/08 on the renewal of the platform, the new term of office of CESI will run until at least October 31 2022.

CESI Secretary General Klaus Heeger welcomed the decision of the European Commission: “As a representative of employees in tax administrations across Europe, CESI has been committed to greater transparency and fairness in European and international taxation for many years. We welcome that the European Commission continues to count on the expertise of CESI also in the future.”

He added: “We will be very vocal about the inherent interlinks between the aim of a social Europe, performing public services and social fairness on the one hand and, on the other, an effective collection of all taxes that are due. Multinationals must also contibute their fair share to tax income by governments. We cannot accept that income from employment is high while multinaitonals find ever new creative solutions to evade taxes or avoid them using shady procedures. Transparency obligations must be increased in Europe and beyond, legal gray zones must be closed and clear-cut taxation rules be enforced. This will also require Member States to hire more tax administration personnel, step up further training opportunities for them, and run more tax inspections.”

More information about the Platform is available on the European Commission’s website and in the European Commission’s Expert group register.

The Commission’s Directorate-General for Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion (DG EMPL) is responsible for EU policy on employment, social affairs, skills, labour mobility and the related EU funding.

https://ec.europa.eu/social/home.jsp

CESI Secretary General Klaus Heeger said: “It is hardly acceptable that policy makers and governments have -rightly- imposed large-scale lockdowns as an unavoidable instrument to face a highly dangerous threat, when afterwards they tell workers in hospitals and other professions in which frequent and intense viral exposure is likely that in the end they do not deserve the highest possible level of protection. Workers across Europe feel let down by the EU, which often portrays itself as a social union.”

Under the so-called regulatory procedure with scrutiny, which applies to the classification of viruses, the European Parliament could still have blocked the decision of the European Commission. However, after the European Commissioner for Jobs, Nicolas Schmit, pledged to encourage member states to include written inormation for employees on how to work in the presence of the virus, no majority was in sight against the European Commission. The Council can still bock the vote, in theory, but a political will is lacking also in that institution.

CESI feels that it does not do justice to workers that the EU has classified COVID-19 as a group 3 virus in the biological agents directive, a category which should include viruses for which “there is usually effective prophylaxis or treatment available”. Given that there is no effective prophylaxis or treatment for COVID-19, clearly, COVID-19 must belong in group 4 which per definition includes viruses for which there is “no effective prophylaxis or treatment available”.

Klaus Heeger concluded: “Workers appreciate if policy makers and citizens clap their hands to say thank for your their work and sacrifice – But what will help them much more is that this will result in concrete action: the best protection measures that are available. As a European umbrella organisation, CESI has in the past continuously tried to bring the EU closer to workers and highlight the benefits that the EU means for them. A classification of COVID-19 as a group 3 agent profoundly torpedoes these efforts. ”

Between 1987 and 2012 she worked for the Federatie Nederlandse Vakbeweging, a trade union federation. She was chair of the federation between 2005 and 2012.

A categorisation of COVID-19 in group 4 of the directive would mean the highest available health and safety and protection standards for workers (potentially) exposed by the virus. A classification in group 3 would mean less protection. Under the so-called regulatory procedure with scrutiny, which applies to the classification of viruses, the European Parliament can block a measure by the European Commission if it is not compatible with the aim and content of the legal act, i.e. in this case the biological agents directive and its definition of the groups of viruses. The European Pariament’s Committee on Employment and Social Affairs will convene on Thursday to discuss and vote on the matter. In today’s letter to the MEPs CESI made clear that:

• as a European trade union confederation CESI represents more than 5 million workers, most notably in the different parts of public services and local, regional and central administrations across Europe. Many of those have been fighting the COVID-19 pandemic in the first row and have made big sacrifices as part of their professional duty to be there for citizens and patients in need. Not only healthcare professionals but also the personnel in police forces, educational institutions, in child and elderly care facilities, and many more. Not few became infected and even paid with their lives;

• against this background, CESI feels that it does not do justice to workers that the European Commission has classified COVID-19 as a group 3 virus in the biological agents directive, a category which should include viruses for which “there is usually effective prophylaxis or treatment available”. Given that there is no effective prophylaxis or treatment for COVID-19, clearly, COVID-19 must belong in group 4 which per definition includes viruses for which there is “no effective prophylaxis or treatment available”;

• it is hardly acceptable that policy makers and governments have (rightly!) imposed large-scale lockdowns as an unavoidable instrument to face a highly dangerous threat, when afterwards they tell workers in hospitals and other professions in which frequent and intense viral exposure is likely that in the end they do not deserve the highest possible level of protection. As a European umbrella organisation, CESI has in the past continuously tried to bring the EU closer to workers and highlight the benefits that the EU means for them. A classification of COVID-19 as a group 3 agent would profoundly torpedo these efforts;

• while from the start of the crisis CESI has publicly called to help firms as much as possible to survive the COVID fallout, it is difficult to accept that alleged excessive administrative burden or other corporate or economic costs is placed above the adequate protection and suffering of workers. There are other ways to help businesses than on the back of workers;

• workers appreciate if policy makers and citizens clap their hands to say thank for your their work and sacrifice – But what will help them much more is that this will result in concrete action: the best protection measures that are available;

• in this context CESI counts on the support of all MEPs to veto the European Commission’s decision and to stand up for a classification of COVID-19 as a group 4 virus.

With such figures, Spain is the country with the second-highest death rate per 100,000 inhabitants, surpassed only by Belgium and higher than in countries such as the United Kingdom, Italy or France, which certainly have a higher number of recorded deaths than in Spain, but whose populations are considerably larger.

The real figures are not known at this moment in time. A recent government statistical study raises the number of infected persons to 2.5 million persons; the deaths recorded in the civil registers reveal that some 15,000 more people have died than were expected to die under normal circumstances in March, April and May.

The Spanish Government’s lack of foresight has left thousands of public workers without appropriate and sufficient means of protection to carry out their duties and cover essential services. We are talking about police, prison, central, regional, local and justice officials, as well as non-health workers in hospitals that are classified as low-risk personnel.

Government negligence is particularly serious in the health services.

On 30 March 2020, CSIF filed a report against the Minister of Health before the Supreme Court.
The report has been filed regarding alleged offences against the rights of workers set forth in Articles 316 and 317 of the Criminal Code and, in relation to the them, the alleged offence of death by negligence (Art. 142) and injury through negligence (Art. 147).
CSIF has not filed a report against the Minister of Health for the overall numbers of the pandemic but, rather, for its lack of foresight in upholding its duty to protect health workers (civil servants).

In terms of figures, Spain has some 515,000 health workers: approximately 51,000 of them have been infected with SARS CoV-2. In other words, 10 per cent of Spain’s health workers have been affected by the coronavirus. Neither the United States of America, nor the United Kingdom, Italy or France, to mention but a few, have reached this level of infections among their health workers. On 30 January 2020, the World Health Organizations (WHO) declared a public health emergency of international concern in connection with the spread of SARS CoV-2. Prior to this, namely on 27 January 2020, CSIF contacted the Ministry of the Civil Service, requesting the establishment of health protection action protocols in anticipation of the novel coronavirus reaching Spain.

The Spanish Government failed to respond to this letter and did not take action until the gravity of the situation surrounding the disease was evident and the WHO had already declared the coronavirus to be a pandemic. The response to the lack of personal protection equipment (PPE) was both late and poor, compounded by the acquisition of fake masks and the irregularities in the export of PPE, leaving our health workers defenceless in the face of the coronavirus.

On 12 May 2020, the report of the alleged offences became a formal complaint against the Minister of Health.

This procedural change means that CSIF features as a party to the proceedings. The events related to the acquisition of fake masks, distributed without having undergone quality control and with the irregularities noted in the export of PPE, were added to the events reported on 30 March 2020.
Currently, in order to back up the accusations made, the formal complaint consists of 38 documents and 22 testimonies of health workers, many of whom have been affected by COVID-19.
The formal complaint contains a request for senior government officials to testify before the Court, beginning with the Minister of Health, and a further request for the Ministry of Health and the General Labour Inspectorate to be investigated.

CSIF remains vigilant in order to avoid any infringement of risk-prevention regulations through our prevention officers.

Other union action lines taken by CSIF

Following the declaration of the outbreak of the novel coronavirus as a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC) by the International Health Regulations (IHR, 2005) Emergency Committee on 30 January, and more specifically, since the declaration of a health emergency in Spain, CSIF has undertaken firm and decisive action, essentially aimed at halting the spread of the virus and protecting the health and rights of workers. CSIF has put forward proposals and initiatives, many of which have been reflected in national regulations throughout this period.

We consider it necessary to highlight the following proposals and initiatives:
• We requested the establishment of prevention protocols across public administrations and the expansion of the definition of the groups exposed to risk of infection.

• The suspension of administrative and legal deadlines.

• The declaration of a state of emergency, the closure of borders and the cessation of non-essential work activities to stop the spread of the virus. (12 March)

• The provision of personal protection equipment (PPE) for our health, social and essential workers, as well as the conducting of PCR tests or other diagnostic tests for persons with a suspected case of COVID-19, for risk groups, and for workers who are joining the workplace or those who have been in contact with infected persons.

• The consideration of COVID-19 as an occupational accident for the purposes of obtaining financial support.

• Special protection for women working during pregnancy or for nursing mothers.

• Special attention paid to gender-based violence during the pandemic.

• The extension of the support measures adopted by the Spanish Government to groups such as domestic workers.

• We proposed amendments to the prevention procedures dictated by the Ministry of Health to protect effectively the health of health workers who have already had to return to their place of work with COVID-19 symptoms.

• CSIF has also actively participated in legislative proposals as, throughout the state of emergency, the Government has used the Royal Decree-Law to enact legislative changes without parliamentary debate within the framework of extraordinary and urgent necessity.

• CSIF, the highest governing body (Trade Union Council), at its meeting held on 28 May, approved a resolution acknowledging the work and commitment of all public workers throughout this health crisis, who with their professionalism, dedication and efforts have kept public services running normally, thus guaranteeing the provision of services to citizens, and also urging the Government to promote investment policies to guarantee the welfare state and to provide high-quality public services.

In parallel, CSIF is working in three areas:
• A request has been made for COVID-19 to be classified as an occupational disease in the health system. We have already succeeded in achieving its recognition as an occupational accident for all intents and purposes.

• We are organizing the defence of our members from all sectors of activity in their complaints made against the Administration, whom we consider to have been grossly negligent in terms of health protection in the workplace, affecting the physical integrity of members.

• We made a request to participate in the committee or working group that has been established to draw up, implement and follow up the necessary recovery plan for public administrations with the aim of strengthening public services that have been put to the test during this pandemic. Issues such as teleworking, digitization and increasing staffing levels are some of our proposals.

Madrid, 1 June 2020

First, on May 18^th, Merkel and Macron surged ahead with a 500 billion proposal, already considered as opening an impressive new chapter of the EU, and then, just nine days later, the serve of the EU Commission.

We have welcomed these new approaches as visionary, innovative and far-sighted, as strong and determined signals of solidarity – between those who have and those who do not, between the strong and the vulnerable.

Because to allow the EU (via the European Commission) to take loans (backed by joint guarantees of the Member States) by emitting own (EU) state bonds, to pass them on mostly as grants (not loans!) to the Member States, and to pay these loans back via new own resources would be a first in EU history.

Accordingly, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen called it “Europe´s moment” and European Parliament President David-Maria Sassoli “Europe´s D-Day “. It is indeed a strong, very strong message – both from the European institutions and most Member States. (And let´s face it: probably largely due to a shift of mind and dogma in Germany.)

Remarkable is also that the Commission proposes to embed the new recovery instrument ‘Next Generation EU’ in a revamped long-term EU budget (Multiannual Financial Framework). This would give the EU and its institutions a major say and influence on the way grants and loans are distributed – in order to give recovery “a shape”, to quote Marta Pilati from the European Policy Centre.

Major sums could underpin policies of green, digital and socially fair transitions, they could be tied to the respect of the rule of law, and soft law instrument like the European Semester could be given unprecedented significance.

As the Commission writes in its adapted work programme: “The need to accelerate the twin green and digital transitions, to build a fairer Europe with an economy that works for people, to strengthen our Single Market and strategic autonomy, to rally round our values, to nurture our democracy and to take our full global responsibilities as a geopolitical actor are ever more acute. This will drive Europe’s recovery and build a more resilient, sustainable and fair Europe.”

Now comes the moment of negotiation, and the battles will probably be fought about the ratio between grants and loans and the conditions attached to them. While it is for example difficult to imagine how agreement on the “rule of law” conditionality would be acceptable for Hungary and Poland (decisions on the MFF and the recovery instrument require unanimity!), the mere size of the recovery instrument and its channelling through EU programmes would provide additional bargaining powers to those insisting on rule of law criteria, a green transition or socially fairer policies. Added to that, long-lasting debates and controversies over conditionalities require time; yet time is crucial for the recovery, as money is needed now.

The next weeks will be decisive in paving the way for both the recovery and the direction we may give to it. For us, trade unions, saving jobs, incomes and decent work will be the main priority. Not yielding on these principles and fiercely defending the interests of our members is not only our duty – it can be considered as an essential service. But we have also to make sure that recovery measures are designed in a way that our societies indeed become more “resilient, sustainable and fair”. And this will require continuous strong social investments as well as considerable spending for public services – being aware that in the aftermath of the economic recession, calls for austerity measures will become virulent.

Admittedly, choices will not always be easy. As discussed recently in our new CESI@home platform, deciding which sacrifices can be expected from us and our members will lead us to answer core ethical questions – for instance when assessing whether the public sector and its workforce should “deliver their part” by accepting cuts or giving up statuses and privileges.

However, the signs of the past weeks, both in terms of the health impact of the virus and the displayed readiness for more solidarity in the EU justify confidence. Because, as often, it is not only about infection and death rates, fiscal stimulus or recovery packages. It is also about our state of mind.

“Altogether, a real vision for the EU is presented, embedded in solidarity”, I concluded my statement on May 28. And it was already in late April when the German Health Minister Jens Spahn wisely and humbly foresaw that “we will probably have to forgive each other a lot in a few months”.

Yes, in times of crisis we need solidarity and a vision for the future. And while solidarity also requires forgiving, a vision creates a state of mind that tells us: Yes, we can. So yes, we will.

Take care of yourselves – and of each other.

It is the first union force in the Administration General of the State (AGE) and the second union force if the regional and local public administration is taken into account. It has an increasing presence in the private sector, being the fourth union force in Spain.

The event, which took place online, was moderated by CESI Secretary General Klaus Heeger together with Birgit Wintermann, project manager for ‘Business in society’ at Bertelsman Stiftung, and featured a panel of speakers including Paul Schoukens, Professor of Social Security Law at KU Leuven, Ilka Wölfle, President of the European Social Insurance Platform (ESIP), and Ben Hoogendam, Relations Manager at CESI’s member CNV-Connectief, the Dutch National Federation of Christian Trade Unions (CNV).

The event took place against the backdrop of the social, economic and labour-market fallout of COVID-19, which has added an immediate urgency to the already existing challenge to ensure adequate social protection for all – in labour markets that had already before COVID-19 been becoming more fragmented over space and time, with employment relationships increasingly diverse and bringing growing risks that economically-active persons in precarious employment, bogus self-employment and the solo self-employed fall through the social security system’s safety nets.

During the discussion among the speakers and with the audience, questions were addressed such as:

• How to achieve a future-oriented world of work with sustainable social security systems and adequate social protection for all?
• How to square this objective with the expected expensive social COVID-19 fallout? And how to reconcile increasing worker mobility with transparent social protection entitlements that are easily transferable between sectors, job types and Member States?
• And what role should be played by the EU, the Member States and social partners, and trade unions in particular?

The debate showed that in particular for typical precarious forms of work, there is still a long-way to in order to provide everyone, including the bogus solo-self-employed with adequate social protection and that the COVID-19 crisis could pose unprecedented challenges for the financial sustainability of existing public social protection systems.

CESI will continue the debate with its partners, its members and with policy-makers at EU and the national levels, based on its recent position paper on the future of work, enriched by the insights of experts such as at yesterday’s CESI@noon.

Dirk Anton was head-lecturer of the Master ‘Stress Management & Organizational Health’ and a board member of the Benelux-chapter of the International Forum for Organizational Health. For 7 years he was chairman of the jury of the IFOH Award.

He works internationally and is fluent in English and German.

Living, working and COVID-19: First findings https://bit.ly/2XC0FeL

Key findings of the report:

– Countries hardest hit by the pandemic see most significant impact on their well-being. Results from some countries are particularly striking, with life satisfaction in France now at its lowest compared to surveys carried out before the crisis.

– Over half of EU respondents are concerned about their future as a result of the COVID-19 crisis, with only 45% feeling optimistic. In contrast to surveys carried out before the pandemic, countries like France, Belgium, Italy and Greece are seeing optimism drop below the EU average.

– People across the EU are reporting dramatically low levels of trust in the EU and in their national governments, particularly in several traditionally pro-EU Member States such as France, Italy and Spain, raising fundamental questions about perceived EU action during the crisis. Share
More than one-quarter of respondents across the EU at this stage report losing their job either temporarily (23%) or permanently (5%), with young men most affected. Half of those in work are also seeing their working hours reduced, especially in Romania, Italy, France, Cyprus and Greece. The Nordic countries have reported fewest reductions in working time.S

– Almost 40% of people in Europe report their financial situation as worse than before the pandemic – double the numbers reported in surveys before the crisis. Close to half are indicating their households cannot make ends meet and over half report they cannot maintain their standard of living for more than three months without an income. The situation is even more dramatic for three-quarters of those unemployed who cannot get by for more than three months with 82% reporting their household has difficulty making ends meet.

In order to arrive at this amount of financial resources, the European Commission proposed to temporarily lift the EU’s financial resources from about 1% to up to 2% of the EU gross national income (GNI) by borrowing, on behalf of all Member States, a total of €750 billion on the financial markets, taking advantage of its strong credit rating.

The European Commission would thus issue bonds on behalf of the EU and the €750 billion be deployed under the MFF into a new flagship ‘Next Generation EU’ programme, designed specifically to help citizens and Member States alleviate the socio-economic COVID-19-fallout that they face.

Resources under the ‘Next Generation EU’ programme would be accessible to the Member States in part in the form of grants and in part in loans. It would consist of three pillars, focussing on:

• “support to Member States with investments and reforms
• kick-starting the EU economy by incentivising private investments
• addressing the lessons of the crisis, by strengthening our health systems and improving crisis management and preparedness”

In addition (in order to make funds available as soon as possible to respond to the most pressing needs), the European Commission proposed to amend the current MFF 2014-2020 to make an additional €11.5 billion in funding available already in 2020.

In a first reaction, CESI Secretary General Klaus Heeger commented: “The package proposed today by the European Commission is a strong and determined signal of solidarity – between those who have and those who do not, between the strong and the vulnerable. Even if it may still not be enough, this proposal, if adopted, would be a major contribution by the EU help Member States alleviate the far-reaching socio-economic impacts and to pave the way for more that is social, digital and green policies. Altogether, a real vision for the EU is presented, embedded in solidarity.””

CESI Vice-President Roberto di Maulo from the Italian Confsal added: “The Next Generation EU is an instrument drafted for the future, for the young generation. The EU taking bonds on behalf of the community is a first. Only by staying united can we build social, digital, resilient and innovative societies and economies and re-emerge stronger together. Solidarity and, where needed, smart and sustainable structural reforms will get us through this crisis. The Italian system will now have to be able to launch those structural reforms that have been on hold for far too long making our country fall back and not very competitive.”

CESI Vice-President Javier Jordán de Urries Sagarna from the Spanish CSIF stressed: “I welcome the the European Commission’s proposal and stress the need for a social dimension at its centre. Workers, many of those in the public sector, have kept public services running and functioning and those in the front line have been the true heroes in fighting COVID-19, but they have also paid high prices. Help and alleviation for them must have priority, and significant investments must be channelled into the public services to make the more performing and prepared for crises.”

CESI President Romain Wolff concluded: “What the European Commission put on the table today is a compromise between the Merkel-Macron call for a €500 billion programme in the form of grants and a proposal of the Frugal Four Group of Austria, the Netherlands, Denmark and Sweden, which had pressured for loans only – to be paid back. Importantly, the European Commission also increased the sum to €750 billion – significantly more than Merkel and Macron had had in mind. In sum, I hope that the European Commission’s proposal has a real prospect to find the backing of all Member States. All have to be aware that Europe has always been about compromise, that nobody can get it all. And in the end, it is about the future of the EU, it is about the future of the next generation, it is about the future of us all!””

More information on the Recovery Plan and new MFF

Como organización profesional, ALE defiende sus intereses profesionales, sociales y económicos dentro del espacio ferroviario europeo.

Info https://lnkd.in/d8vcDMm

“Trade unions and employers’ associations contribute to the defence and promotion of the economic and social interests which they represent. Their creation and the exercise of their activities shall be free in so far as they respect the Constitution and the law. Their internal structure and their functioning must be democratic.”

Furthermore, article 28 of the Constitution includes freedom of association (trade unions and employers’ association) as a fundamental right. According to the case-law of the Constitutional Court, this right is individual in nature. In other words, it belongs to each individual worker, but it is exercised collectively through trade unions or employers’ organizations.

Similarly, in accordance with occupational safety and health (OSH) regulations, trade unions play an essential role in implementing occupational health protection measures that, at the moment, are closely linked with the measures to ensure the protection of public health and with the fight to contain and eliminate SARS CoV-2.

For this reason, it is not surprising that regulation SND/307/2020, issued on 30 March during the strictest phase of the lockdown in Spain (30 March – 12 April), stipulates that the restrictions on normal work activities that had been in place generally since 14 March do not apply to the activities of trade unions and employers’ organizations during the emergency health situation in order to guarantee assistance and advice to employees and employers. In other words: the activities of trade unions are considered as essential services for society.

It should not be forgotten that thousands of workers in the public and private sectors have remained in the workplace since the health emergency was declared. Moreover, there are many regulations affecting employment and working conditions that the Government dictates every week in various areas, such as:

• Protection of occupational health, monitoring of and guidance on specific recommendations and regulations in this area;
• Collective bargaining to ensure the rights of workers to information, to participate in and be consulted on the COVID-19 measures before such measures are adopted;
• Mobility restrictions on the way to work and back home;
• Essential and non-essential activities for society;
• Shifts at the workplace;
• Protocols to tackle positive cases of COVID-19 or potential case;
• Sick leave;
• Demands for personal or collective protection equipment (PPE and CPE) or items such as face masks and so on;
• Security measures in the workplace;
• Temporary lay-offs in businesses that have closed due to the COVID-19 lockdown measures;
• Unemployment benefits;
• Teleworking, etc.

Miguel Borra

President of CSIF

Central Independent and Public Employees’ Trade Union

We think first and foremost of all employees working in public hospitals who have shown willingness to perform special assignments, rearrange their routines, work in protective clothing and (still) accept the risks. They are worthy of admiration, and this too is public service.

Equally in our thoughts are the law enforcement agencies and police officers working hard to keep us safe, ensuring that the Federal Government’s emergency decree is being observed and that border restrictions are being respected. They do this whilst accepting the additional personal risk and, as we see across the board, whilst deploying impeccable judgement. This too is public service.

We think of all the teachers who very quickly made the switch to web-based teaching to ensure that pupils wouldn’t miss out on their education; we also think of the teaching staff providing childcare services in the cantons during the spring school holidays, despite not being part of their job description, and also at some personal risk. This too is public service.

However, we also think of those working in the administration who quickly managed to conduct the necessary background research to prepare for executive decisions in the form of the emergency decree, instructions and recommendations in a situation that changed by the hour which meant adapting the rules accordingly (under unimaginable pressure): that too is public service.

We also think of all the employees who have rallied to offer financial support for companies (the number is very, very high); financial resources had to be discussed, grant procedures had to be fast-tracked and designed for efficiency (the numbers ran into the hundreds of thousands: incredible figures), and then managed here by the administration: that too is public service.

We need electricity, gas and water to keep our infrastructure running, to heat our homes and to keep our electric kitchen appliances running too, which have seen much greater usage in recent weeks. There has been no disruption to these services; water, electricity and gas are over 90% publicly-owned and the systems have operated flawlessly: that too is public service.

We think of all the employees who are still making sure that our wastewater is being processed and that waste is being properly disposed of, wherever it is created. At the onset of the crisis, some voices were suggesting that the health problems that caused the pandemic would be prognosticated as a scourge, but also, crucially, that it would lead to a breakdown in public order. That did not happen: this too is public service.

The list could go on and on: just because we could not name every public service here, it doesn’t mean they are not included: it applies to all.

A perusal of the reports on Switzerland’s response to the pandemic shows that the country has been praised for both the quality and the speed of its reaction. Of course, critical voices must still be heard domestically, on the issue of whether all measures are still fit for purpose, whether certain restrictions could start to be eased here and there; this is part and parcel of democracy and paves the way for finding well-balanced solutions. But the standard has been set.

It should not be forgotten that public services have been just as affected as to all other companies by the restrictions that were introduced as part of the state of emergency. We must continue to apply these norms. And yet it has been possible to keep public services running and make all the required changes in recent weeks swiftly and reliably. That suggests a robust public administration that is equipped with the necessary means and expertise and in particular the personal dedication of each employee to be able to act at any time, even under exceptional circumstances. If ever a test were needed to prove it: this is the result.

In the last few weeks, Öffentliches Personal Schweiz has received a large volume of enquiries about employment law; they have spanned issues such as working from home, being assigned to different jobs, overtime and flexitime credits, rearranging holidays, untaken leave, protective measures in the workplace, the obligation to work on-site for particularly vulnerable people, questions about the vulnerability of not especially high-risk people too, medical certificates, suspected illnesses, childcare duties, how to look after children whilst working from home and much more.

The basis for addressing these queries could and still can be found at the federal level, in the cantons and even in the municipalities; with information often being updated every few days. The basic tone of all enquiries was, however, the same: nobody wanted to complain, everyone was ready and willing, even if it meant violating laws and regulations, to continue offering their services without complaint. That is gratifying to witness in a situation like this: and that too is public service.

We are not forgetting that in many instances our private sector colleagues have been denied the opportunity to offer assistance because their company is no longer viable. And nor are we are forgetting all of those who, like those in public services, are getting on with their jobs with all the entailed risks so that our country can continue to receive essential provisions, especially where the supply of food is concerned.

COVID-19 is no good thing. It has placed significant limitations on our lives. But we also see that our State and its public services have passed this stress test; and not just passed it, but have gone about it with dedication, speed and precision. We cannot say for certain what the future will hold, but we may indeed be able to predict the more immediate future. We are hoping for a speedy recovery and we thank all of those who allow us to keep living largely normal lives in the meantime.

But there is one thing we would like to make clear. Any savings measures in conjunction with COVID-19 would be perceived as a blatant attack on public officials and we would oppose them with all of our might.

Urs Stauffer

President of the Swiss Central Association of Public Personnel

Zentralverband Öffentliches Personal Schweiz (ZV)

A lo largo de estos más de 30 años de lucha, SATSE se ha posicionado como el sindicato con mayor implantación en el sector sanitario, caracterizándose por la defensa de la profesión y de quienes la ejercen. En la actualidad, más de 124.000 profesionales de Enfermería y Fisioterapia integran la organización.

The European Commission’s (non-binding) guidelines for the Member States on how to resume travel and tourism in Europe in (hopefully) safe and coordinated manner include an entire package with the following elements:
• an overall strategy towards recovery in 2020 and beyond;
• a common approach to restoring free movement and lifting restrictions at EU internal borders in a gradual and coordinated way;
• a framework to support the gradual re-establishment of transport whilst ensuring the safety of passengers and personnel;
• a recommendation which aims to make travel vouchers an attractive alternative to cash reimbursement for consumers;
• criteria for restoring tourism activities safely and gradually and for developing health protocols for hospitality establishments such as hotels.

According to the European Commission, its proposed guidance aims to give citizens a perspective to “catch up with friends and family, in their own EU country or across borders, with all the safety and precautionary measures needed in place” and to help the EU tourism sector recover from the pandemic by supporting businesses and ensuring that Europe “continues to be the number one destination for visitors.” The European Commission stressed that social partners should be centrally involved in the Member States’ deconfinement deliberations.

CESI Secretary General Klaus Heeger stressed: “It is positive news that the European Commission strives to coordinate a common approach to deconfinement in Europe, which is absolutely desirable. Even if the COVID-19 incidence varies nationally, regionally and even locally, deconfinement should not be as chaotic as the confinement was. Member states should take the European Commission’s deconfinement guidelines as a basis to ensure a common approach in Europe and beef them up where necessary to ensure a responsible deconfinement based above all on scientific advice. It will also be central that Member States will hear and consider the constructive concerns and suggestions of all trade unions and social partners.“

CESI Vice-President Javier Jordán de Urries Sagarna from the Spanish CSIF added: “Tourism is one of the most important sectors for the Spanish economy. While the EU guidelines to jumpstart travel and tourism in Europe are very important, the priority must be the safety of the workforce. Every workers needs to be equipped with the necessary protective equipment, and no worker should be at irresponsible risk when resuming his or her function. Deconfinement must be cautious and put the health of workers and citizens first.”

Beyond the guidelines, on May 13, European Commission President von der Leyen also presented to the European Parliament a glimpse into envisaged proposals for a Corona-adjusted new Multinannual Financial Framework (MFF) for 2021-2027 and a new EU Recovery Instrument dedicated to help Member States in the longer term to mitigate the social and economic Corona fallout financially and in terms of investments.

CESI Vice-President Roberto di Maulo from the Italian Confsal concluded: “Further help by the EU is necessary for workers and businesses in hard-hit countries such as Italy. I expect not only a swift adoption of the EU’s SURE programme to support wages of affected workers in the Member States. The European Commission should also quickly publish its proposals for a Recovery Instrument and an adjusted new Multiannual Financial Framework for the EU for 2021-2027 which gives Member States the prospects to fight the Corona fallout effectively and avoid excessive economic and social costs. Furthermore, interventions in support of the economies of individual states cannot be left to the European Central Bank alone. The first outlook of the Recovery Instrument and MFF presented by President von der Leyen to the European Parliament seems positive, and we now need concrete and ambitious proposals on the table.”

More information about the tourism and transport deconfinement guidelines
Further information about Ms von der Leyen’s sketch of an adjusted new MFF proposal and a new EU Recovery Instrument, as presented to the European Parliament

Présent dans les établissements privés sous contrat de l’enseignement général, technique et agricole, il s’implique dans toutes les réformes concernant le monde éducatif et ses personnels : formation initiale et continue, carrière et emploi, protection sociale, conditions de travail, retraite.

Fédération nationale des SPELC

A lo largo de estos más de 30 años de lucha, SATSE se ha posicionado como el sindicato con mayor implantación en el sector sanitario, caracterizándose por la defensa de la profesión y de quienes la ejercen. En la actualidad, más de 124.000 profesionales de Enfermería y Fisioterapia integran la organización.

Recent economic shocks, such as the 2008 global financial crisis, have shown that young people were among those most affected by unemployment (often more than double compared to the average unemployment rate), especially in Southern European countries.

Unfortunately, this time predictions show even more worrying trends, while one has to take into account that unemployment rates had not yet even recovered to the pre-2008 levels (the EU youth unemployment rate in 2019 was still circa 14%, European Commission 2019). Furthermore, there is an alarming number of youngsters not in employment, education or training (NEET’s), an estimated 2.4 million at the end of 2017.

“Failing to invest in youth policies nowadays leads to a lack of innovation in the future. We need investment from the beginning of the crisis in youth policies. Back in 2008, instruments which should bring back young people into the labour market were only introduced 5 years later, after the financial crisis, when the consequences were already felt. This time, we have to keep the young in the labour market and prevent the rise of youth unemployment. This way, we would also prevent major financial efforts to increase the levels of youth employment”, commented CESI Youth Representative, Matthäus Fandrejewski.

Another risk factor is the fact that young people and are overrepresented in the gig economy or in atypical work, such as part-time work, fixed-term work or temporary work. Being less protected by labour law of social security schemes, economic shocks increase these workers’ vulnerability both in terms of employment, income and social protection.

Furthermore, the COVID19 crisis is likely to have a bigger impact on youth unemployment and underemployment since young workers are overrepresented in the sectors most affected by the pandemic such as retail or tourism. This also concerns those who are studying and who use their summer break to work and save money for the next academic year.

The economic globalisation and the logic of market competition have contributed to an increase of non-standard work, which favour precariousness of employment, income and working conditions. Unfortunately, many young people do not recognize their precariousness as such anymore, due to a lack of awareness and a changing world of work, which is truly alarming. Taking this precarious employment as normal employment might lead to a long-term standardization of precarious work for youth.

This has the potential to further increase the social divide by driving more and more young people into poverty, in-work poverty and social exclusion. This is particularly worrying since the first years of a career have an exponential impact on the lifetime earnings. Therefore, entering the labour market during an economic recession has the potential to damage a young person’s career and life, not only in the short-term, but also in the long-term.

Against this background, CESI Youth advocates for stronger youth policies in light of the COVID19 crisis, and an allocation of more funds to programmes such as apprenticeships, traineeships, internships or the Youth Guarantee.

Apprenticeship or VET-schemes in particular can be truly valuable during an economic crisis since they address labour market skills’ mismatches and prepare young people to enter the workforce by providing them with targeted skills.

For students which are in apprenticeship programmes, fair and transparent conditions about the existing programmes are needed– especially when it comes to programmes which are currently on their finishing line and to students who find themselves on risk to drop out of their programmes. Against this background, no apprentice should drop out of the existing programs.

The so-called Youth Guarantee can have a fundamental role in fostering youth employment by implementing wage compensation tools for internships, apprenticeships or traineeships. It therefore requires additional funding. In this context, it is also important to ensure equal access to opportunities.

“It is now the time to reinforce the Youth Guarantee and make it an effective tool for young people in a short and longtime perspective – it is time to offer quality jobs, traineeships and further education”, Matthäus Fandrejewski added.

In this light, it is also important to strengthen the role of youth organisations and social partners in the design and implementation of such schemes, since they bring the know-how and insight into the day-to-day struggles of young people. This would also lead to more democratic and transparent policy-making and would better meet the needs of the young.

Young people and young workers cannot once again take the hardest hit in this economic crisis. Youth empowerment and support for youth policies are fundamental to the development of a more democratic, inclusive, politically engaged and civic-minded society. This is unlikely to happen if young people remain financially dependent on their families. The full support of the youth ensures social inclusion, equal access to opportunities, improvement of the welfare state, and, not least, it enables everyone to reach their full potential and creativity.

“These days young people are showing solidarity to their communities by taking care of the elder, in hospitals, care homes or simply their neighbourhoods, by stepping back from social life, which for some might mean being completely alone away from friends and family, or even by organising joint initiatives to collect donations and help the most vulnerable. Please don’t forget us in the aftermath of the crisis!”, Matthäus Fandrejewski concluded.

Gorica Djokic is a Medical Doctor PhD with a demonstrated history of working in the mental health care industry. Skilled in Clinical Research, Medical Education, Medicine, Neurology, and Clinical Trials. Strong healthcare services professional graduated from Belgrade University School of Medicine.

https://www.cesi.org/members/slfs/

“The conclusions of the 2020 economic forecast are no surprise, they confirm what we know already: We are facing the threat of an unprecedented fast-track to economic recession and unemployment.

An unprecedented effort is therefore needed by the EU to support Member States to keep the downturn at bay as much as possible. The last crisis, which also started abruptly with a sudden implosion of financial systems, resulted in an economic and then social crisis whose consequences we still feel today. The policy reaction throughout Europe was austerity and budget cuts. It is clear that this made the economy and societies vulnerable, as cuts in public services reduced the resilience of the state and the society to face crises. It is tragic and ironic that the budget cuts from the last crisis have aggravated the current pandemic crisis in many Member States. Spain or Italy would have fared better -and in the end saved money!- and have had fewer deaths if their health systems had not been drained through cuts in facilities, equipment and staff. Expenditure in quality public services is no cost, it is an investment that will more than pay off in the long term.

What we need now is an EU that shows a clear commitment to performing public services and to an investment agenda of unprecedented scope. We must patch up past mistakes and make our states more resilient again, and at the same time we must take measures for job creation, consumption demand and a socially friendly ecological transition of our economies.

Investing now in resilient societies and public services will not come cheap. But it is clear that under-investing as during the last 10 years and risking high unemployment will be more expensive. The EU’s recovery plan should reflect this, and the EU should streamline its fiscal and economic governance system to encourage more necessary public investments in the Member States.”

In a much-awaited decision, the German Federal Constitutional Court ruled on Tuesday 5th of May that Germany’s central bank (Bundesbank) should suspend the implementation of the European Central Bank’s critical bond-buying programmes, the Public Sector Purchase Programme (PSPP), as long as the ECB does not sufficiently assess the proportionality and economic policy effects of its monetary stimulus when shoring up the eurozone’s economies.

The Court underlined that the decision ”does not concern any financial assistance measures taken by the EU or the ECB in the context of the current coronavirus crisis”, i.e. the recently announced 750 billion Pandemic Emergency Purchase Programme (PEPP).

Democratic principles, i.e. the ‘democratic power of action of the (German) citizens’, are breached in cases in which EU institutions act beyond their competences (ultra vires). In the specific case, the Court deplored that the German Government and Bundestag did not “actively take steps” against the ECB which acted beyond its competence when it failed to “conduct the necessary balancing of the monetary policy objective against the economic policy effects arising from the programme (PSPP)”. Noteworthy: The ECB exceeded its monetary policy mandate only by failing to do so; the German Federal Constitutional Court did not question the PSPP itself.

In December 2018, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) had found that the PSPP “falls within the area of monetary policy, in respect of which the EU has exclusive competence for the Member States whose currency is the euro, and observes the principle of proportionality.” According to the CJEU, the ECB had hence not acted beyond its competences. The German Court´s is as a slap in the face of the Eu Court, since it qualified the CJEU´s 2018 review of the PSPP as ‘not comprehensible’ and hence ‘ultra vires’. “The CJEU´s view manifestly fails to give consideration to the importance and scope of the principle of proportionality … and is simply untenable from a methodological perspective given that it completely disregards the actual economic policy effects of the programme”.

These additional requirements from the ECB -namely to carefully assess whether a programme is proportionate, taking into account adverse other effects, including of social nature- should remain rather a formality to fulfil. After all, it is the daily work of the national banks to weigh the pros and cons of monetary decisions, and clearly deliberations took place within the ECB as well as in public fora and the media. They were just not formalised. So this judgment does not mean the end of the eurozone, as some commentators proclaim. And, certainly not marginal in our days: The judgment neither declares the PSPP as ‘ultra vires’ nor does it concern the current ECB Corona programme. Accordingly, financial markets largely remained relaxed.

The downsides of this judgment are salient. As we know, one of the fundamental principle of the EU as a supranational is the uniform application of EU law which requires EU law to prevail over national (even constitutional) laws (as long it guarantees a sufficient level of fundamental rights protection). And it is up to the CJEU “to interpret and apply the Treaties so to ensure uniformity and coherence of EU law”. Nonetheless, the Member States remain ‘Masters of the Treaties’, and national constitutional courts maintain the right to review EU acts on grounds of “ultra vires”; especially, so the German Court, when the job is not done by the EU Court.

It will have implications on the question which court (national or EU) has the last say in EU/national competence disputes, possibly leaving a weakened EU legal order behind. A shift of power back to the national legal orders could be the consequence. This gives rise to two major concerns: Firstly, denouncing national practices (let us just think of Poland or Hungary) for violating EU fundamental rights and principles or for defying the supremacy of the jurisprudence of the CJEU will be increasingly difficult to maintain. Secondly, the currently so strongly needed and invoked unity of the EU in face of the pandemic suffers a blow; a boost for Eurosceptics in these difficult times.

A superb judgement. Not helpful in these days.

The EU´s economy has been and continues to be deeply affected by the long lockdown, causing great difficulties to millions of families.

Initial uncertainties of European institution and self-centeredness of Member States in the first phase gave rise to euro sceptical forces which fed anti-European feelings, acting on the fears of citizens and amplifying their ideological exploitation and the spread of fake news.

But the emergency we are facing requires responsibility, courage and organization.

This note aims at giving clear and real data on the commitment of Europe in the management of the pandemic crisis.

What is going on

After the first moment of confusion, today we must recognise that the EU is playing its part.

In the beginning, the ECB, but also other European institutions, underestimated the extent of the pandemic, as so did most of the national governments, not only in Europe.

Now, the EU is planning a joint response to the pandemic in order to strengthen the health sector and to mitigate the socio-economic impact of the crisis.

The way the EU is facing this crisis is certainly not the EU we have always dreamed of: there are still too many national egoisms which have prevented the strengthening of common policy and economic instruments.

Egoisms and divisions have been visible also within Member states. This lies in the nature of ‘local’ approaches and responsibilities of governance, where each community, even the smallest, tends to protect its own interests ad people – often however with negative repercussions on the wider social and health systems.

A global crisis needs common solutions

The consequence of this “sovereignty”: “If I shut in within my borders I cannot prevent the Dutch or the Germans from doing the same. “

But in the face of a crisis that is upsetting the already precarious global balances, no state can shield itself from the crisis and its socio-economic impacts on its own.

The virus knows no borders. Countries like Australia or New Zealand, isolated for their location and structure, have nevertheless been hardly affected by the pandemic.

In the face of a global crisis, we need global solutions that the mobilization of political, medical, economic, fiscal and monetary responses that are not possible for a single country. Europe must respond adequately to what China and the US do in order not to lag in the post-pandemic reconstruction.

What has already been done by the ECB and Ecofin.

In April, the European Central Bank approved the Pandemic Emergency Purchase Programme (PEPP) worth 750 billion euros for the purchase of government bonds on the market, in order to ensure liquidity and contain the risk of an unmanageable rise of interest rates.

This last programme is added to the 300 billion euros purchase of government bonds, reaching the figure of 1,050 billion euros in purchases. In March, the Council of Economic Ministers of the EU (ECOFIN) activated the suspension clause the Stability Pact for a “severe economic downturn”, allowing increased public spending.

European aid for reconstruction

On 9th of April, the Eurogroup (the coordination of the Ministers of the Economy of the 19 Eurozone countries) adopted a proposal for three instruments to support states:

The use of the European Stability Mechanism (ESM) on the sole condition that resources shall be used for direct and indirect health expenditure related to the Coronavirus emergency, without the need for an analysis of the public debt of the state requiring the activation of the Fund.

Common bonds issued by the European Investment Bank (EIB) to provide liquidity and guarantees directly to enterprises.

A new fund called SURE (an acronym for Support to mitigate Unemployment Risk in an emergency) intended to finance part of the national short-time work programmes.

ESM

The European Stability Mechanism, (ESM) is a European fund financed by the states, established in 2012 to support particularly hit Member State in the aftermath of the 2008-2009 financial and economic crisis.

It may intervene – at the request of an EU Member State in economic difficulty – to provide financial assistance by granting soft loans or by recapitalising banks. The ESM was deployed to save Ireland, Greece, Portugal, Cyprus and Spain.

The real advantage of the ESM, in addition to providing liquidity at virtually zero cost to support businesses and families, is to facilitate access to the OMT (Outright Monetary Transactions) program, the famous ‘Bazooka’ announced by Mario Draghi: The unlimited purchase by the ECB on the secondary market for government bonds.

The new ESM without conditions

Before Covid19

Access to the ESM aid is based on strict conditions and a fiscal adjustment plan.

Access is granted after a debt sustainability analysis.

The resources are disbursed in several steps in order to verify the achievement of the required objectives.

After Covid19

Access to ESM aid is unconditional (for direct and indirect health expenditure related to the Coronavirus emergency).

The resources (up to 2% GDP) are set only for expenses related to the emergency.

There is no debt sustainability analysis.

Resources disbursed in a single solution.

Why say ‘yes’ to the ESM

The ESM could immediately lend 240 billion euros. It is the cheapest and quickest way to find resources to support the health sector affected by the acute phase of the virus.

The activation of the ESM opens the door for unlimited purchases of government bonds on the secondary market by the ECB (the Otms, the ‘Bazooka’ of Draghi): this would ensure that spread is kept under control.

If each country did it alone, interest rates would continue to rise until it would become unsustainable.

What is ‘SURE’

It is a new tool specifically aimed at saving jobs; however, it needs to be activated.

It is meant to support Member States (which would have to take loans. i.e. to further increase public debt) for temporary measures to avoid layoffs.

The operating system is very similar to that of the ESM, yet the resources can be used exclusively to save employment. In this crisis, an instrument of such a scale has never been set up for workers. It is the first common instrument in Europe for social schemes and will be worth 100 billion euros.

While the ESM is an already active instrument, SURE must be created (and therefore financed) and requires the immediate payment of guarantees, meaning an increase of public expenditure.

How the EIB works

The European Investment Bank is a European institution capable of issuing common bonds.

It exists since 1957 to finance projects which contribute to the achievement of the European Union’s objectives.

To fight the socio-economic impacts of the Corona-crisis, the EIB will intervene to lend up to 240 billion euros of liquidity or guarantees directly to companies.

Eurobond or Coronabond

Today, the EU is not able to issue own bonds in the same way as a national state because it has no fiscal capacity of its own to guarantee the repayment of loans: new European governance will be needed, with supranational powers on taxation and finance.

All state aid mechanisms (ESM, SURE) issue common debt securities to raise resources backed by guarantees and shares of EU Member States.

Today, the only way to activate a so-called Eurobonds system would be to create a new instrument, somewhat identical to the ESM: a fund (with immediate payment of guarantees by the Member States, thus having a direct impact on public debt) able to issue bonds and give loans to the EU Member States in need – yet this is still far from finding agreement among the EU Member States.

What could we do then?

We could interpret the definition of “expenses related to the health emergency” of the ESM in the widest possible way, including economic and financial costs induced by the health crisis.

We have to make sure that access to the ESM also gives access to OMT of the ECB – that is to say to open the possibility for the ECB to proceed to the unlimited purchase of government bonds on the secondary market.

We have to have our voices heard in the process of the establishment of the so-called “Recovery Fund”, both in terms of design and amount.

Recovery fund

The proposal should not include debts of the past (i.e. it should not lead to German taxpayers paying for the Italian debt; nor should it impose national restructuring measures, as has the classic ESM, by the ‘infamous’ troika), but, as has been decided, it should establish common investment targets and the thereto related issue of government bonds.

The Recovery Fund should ensure that – through the 2021-2027 budget of the EU- the economies of the EU 27 are relaunched and the solidarity between the Member States is ensured.

The Recovery Fund would be temporary, targeted and proportionate, to face the extraordinary costs of the current crisis.

It should aim at least 1 trillion euros.

In conclusion

The EU certainly reacted too late, and national emergency policies prevented it from deploying its strength. But considering the now agreed upon interventions, impressive financial means have been made available to the economy.

1750 billion by the ECB, the suspension of the balance-sheet obligation, 100 billion by SURE, 240 billion by the new ESM (without conditions for health expenditure related to the Coronavirus), 200 billion by the EIB and not least the expected at least 1 trillion by the Recovery Fund. This represents a mass of investments and loans higher than those of the USA and China.

They must certainly be made available soon and without too many obstacles nor bureaucratic constraints. If this is the case, we can say that the EU will be up to the challenge!

European Economic Forecast, institutional Paper 121, February 2020.

“As countries implement necessary quarantines and social distancing practices to contain the pandemic, the world has been put in a Great Lockdown. The magnitude and speed of collapse in activity that has followed is unlike anything experienced in our lifetimes… This makes the Great Lockdown the worst recession since the Great Depression, and far worse than the Global Financial Crisis.”

Gita Gopinath, Director of the Research Department at the International Monetary Fund (IMF), 14th of April 2020.

Dear colleagues, members, partners and friends,

In Belgium, as in most European states, we are preparing ourselves to restart a ‘normal’ life as measures are gradually loosened after seven weeks of strict containment. And it is not only about social distancing and the respect of hygiene measures. It is also about facing our fears.

During the past months, keeping distance, wearing masks and everlasting frequent handwashing have been rammed down our throats as being key for survival. And while the ritual of body counting press conferences, has been dictating the rhythm of our daily lives, worries have been our most loyal companions.

Will I be hit? What about my family, my parents, wife, children and friends? What about my business, my job, my pension? What will be the overall impacts on our societies, on our wealth and safety? In addition to the countless deaths and human tragedies, what are the socio-economic impacts of the ‘Great Lockdown’, which, according to the IMF, “is the worst recession since the Great Depression, and far worse than the Global Financial Crisis”?

And what if it becomes even worse?

The moment we take comfort in decreasing death tolls, infection rates and hospital admissions, news of second Corona waves, tremendous economic impacts, climate change and disappearing species are standing ready (and re-emerge) to nip in the bud even the smallest glimmer of hope for a rosier future.

In other words: Be scared. And never stop to be. It might always get worse.

These are messages have been drummed into our minds in the past weeks, months and years. This is nothing unusual, one may say, but having to cope with the emergence of three existential threats – the Coronavirus itself, the socio-economic impact of the ’Great Lockdown’ and not least climate change- challenges our lives, our way of life, our natural and economic resources, and not least our mental state in an unprecedented way since WWII.

Maybe this is due to my old age, maybe also to a lack of foresight or simply to childish despite, but I refuse somewhat to submit myself to doomsayers’ apocalyptic prophecies. And I believe in our capacities to overcome crises.

“There are some hopeful signs that this health crisis will end. Countries are succeeding in containing the virus using social-distancing practices, testing, and contact tracing, at least for now, and treatments and vaccines may develop sooner than expected,” Gita Gopinath from the IMF also said.

And witnessing all the essential workers – those who fight at the front, who keep our public services and our societies going at this very crucial moment-, but also experiencing the tireless commitment of our CESI members to defend their affiliates who are exposed to immediate health risks or to the devastating socio-economic impacts of the ‘Great Lockdown’, is heart-warming and comforting. It shows we are willing to fight.

That is our hope.

Of course, as many virologists, epidemiologists and economists are saying these days: The only certainty is uncertainty. And uncertainty is difficult to bear; it paralyses and brings doubt and fear. But without uncertainty, there is no hope, and while hope paves the way for confidence, the latter allows the fullhearted tackling of the challenges.

Our Presidium has outlined the most immediate and urgent needs: Financial assistance for companies and businesses, the safeguard of employment decent income and working conditions, performing health services and strong public services for sustainable societies, more competence for the EU and solidarity among the Member States in cases of pandemics, a tribute to the heroes of our times and not least… solidarity!

The EU (in spite of severe initial difficulties) and its Member States have set up a multitude of monetary, financial, fiscal, and economic initiatives; mostly through loans admittedly, but their instruments, design and amounts were unimaginable two months ago. The instrument which, to a considerable extent, deliver proof of solidarity.

On Labour Day, as every year, we all assured each other of our full solidarity. But to fight the virus and the economic and social consequences of the ‘Great Lockdown’ will require more. It will require solidarity between those who have and those who don’t, between the strong and the vulnerable, between the old and the young, within societies and between nations.

And what we promised on Labour Day must be kept in the future. That is our commitment. That is our vocation.

That is our hope.

Take care of yourselves – and of each other.

Take a look at CESI’s position paper on COVID19.

“Today, in the face of the Corona crisis, we have to express our immense gratitude to those who are at the front line in the fight against the crisis, risking their lives and health – for us all.

Especially today, we must recall that our vocation is to protect those who protect, to care for those who care, to defend those who defend.

Especially today, we must recall that we must stand united to overcome this crisis as quickly as possible – whatever it takes.

And especially today, we have to realise that even more solidarity will be needed to face the future.

In the past weeks and months, we have seen much solidarity. But to fight both the virus and the economic and social consequences of the ‘Great Lockdown’ will require more.

It will require solidarity between those who have and those who don´t, between the strong and the vulnerable, within societies and between nations.

And what we promise today, on Labour Day, must be kept in the future.

We will be put to the test.

Today, despite the looming crisis, we wish everyone a Happy Labour Day. To honour all workers. To pay tribute to them. To commit ourselves to more solidarity.”

***
For further information on CESI’s position on the Corona crisis and the future of work, please see CESI’s papers on the future of work, social protection and interest representation and on the COVID-19 pandemic in Europe.

Responding to findings of the EU’s gender equality and fundamental rights agencies EIGE and FRA published yesterday, Kirsten Lühmann said: “What we have feared and predicted at the outset of the crisis is being confirmed: The COVID-19 crisis has an important negative impact on women and gender equality, and particularly worrying is an observed spike in domestic violence during the current lockdowns and confinements in many Member States. Together with job and financial uncertainties in many households, COVID-restrictions seem to lead to stress levels in families which result in violence.”

She added: “In early March, just before the Coronavirus hit Europe hard, we stated our appreciation to the European Commission’s new Gender Equality Strategy for the years 2020 t0 2025. We were particularly encouraged to see a more ambitious European agenda than during the previous years and clear objectives especially for the fight against domestic violence.”

“As the EU institutions have shifted their agenda totally -and rightly so- to the acute management of the COVID-19 crisis, the EU response to the crisis must not only be about financial and economic alleviations. It must include a dedicated social dimension and in particular seek to ensure the safety and security of women. More than before, the EU Gender Equality Strategy must be implemented. In the European Commission’s response to the COVID-crisis, domestic violence must not fall off the table and become collateral damage of the crisis. The European Commission must bring the findings of its specialist agencies EIGE and FRA to the table”, she concluded.

Once the early days of confinement were over and we had overcome the initial bewilderment, we quickly saw that the only option remaining to save teaching was to look to online solutions using digital platforms and tools.

With the crisis not set to abate any time soon, the only option has been to improvise. The educational system was not in a position to switch to online learning in record time in order to respond to a situation like this. It has meant taking major methodological strides in the use of digital tools to ensure that academic activities remained within reach of the entire student population.

It goes without saying that teachers, families, pupils and educational administrators have all reacted with the utmost goodwill but the fact remains that, with this shift to an online learning system, not everyone had the same conditions starting out, nor have they had access to the same resources and capacities. The result is that the digital divide has revealed enormous differences among the students who have not been able to get their online learning processes up and running in time as they enter the final part of the school year. From the moment the alert was issued and educational centres closed their doors, teaching staff have made colossal efforts, beginning with making their own IT infrastructure available to the system, and then having to adapt to this new situation in which neither all schools nor all families had the digital tools to be able to resume normal academic activity and take on such a monumental challenge in such a short space of time.

We have had to resort to digital platforms and major digital applications launched by major corporations and the biggest names in multinational communications, who have had to adapt to this highly complex reality as it has unfolded. Educational authorities have also attempted to address the inadequacies urgently, offering digital tools to the students most in need, but they have not been able to compensate for all of the shortcomings. All of this has further highlighted the economic and social inequalities of our education system which, although they may be becoming less apparent in the classroom day-to-day, have only grown larger at home since confinement.

ANPE (Spanish National Association of Teachers) has called upon the Ministry of Education and Autonomous Educational Communities to draft clear and specific instructions to adapt the end of the school year and to regulate learning conditions, adapt curricula contents and standardise the criteria, assessment, graduation and certification of students. This has not been an easy undertaking as we have had to adapt to this new teleworking reality to relay these measures to authorities and publicise our proposals and demands to all teaching staff. The aim of these proposals is to ensure that the educational system suffers as little disruption as possible, for institutions’ autonomy to be respected as well as teachers’ academic freedom and for the principle of equal opportunities to be upheld for all students in all parts of our national territory.

To date, we still do not know how long this situation will last and whether or not this term will see a return to classroom teaching. At ANPE we have said that if at all possible, and only pending relevant authorisation from the health authorities, this would only apply to the students approaching the end of their courses and aiming to graduate, thus minimising disruption to their educational and personal prospects. We refer to students in the fourth year of their secondary (compulsory) education, the second year of Baccalaureate and the final courses of basic, intermediate or upper level vocational education. Regardless of the final decision, we have to prepare ourselves for the forthcoming academic year against an uncertain and worrying backdrop in which the pandemic is not yet under control.

For this reason, we have contacted the educational authorities to raise issues which we consider as priorities: the first is to draft basic legislation for the whole State on adapting the curriculum, assessment criteria, course promotion and graduation requirements. The second has to do with a possible return to classroom teaching by the next academic year which will require health safeguarding protocols spanning the full spectrum of measures put in place to protect the health of the whole educational community. Access to institutions and the use of all facilities must be regulated in a way that respects all disinfecting and social distancing measures. It is likely that flexible timetables and shift patterns will be required to meet all of these requirements. The third fundamental issue in our view is to draft a digitalisation plan for the whole State which includes common digital tools and platforms available to all students and their families so that no student is denied the possibility of continuing to learn and supplement their knowledge online. We have to be prepared for a scenario that alternates between classroom learning and remote teaching.

We can only reiterate once more our public gratitude and support to the whole teaching body for the commitment, effort and professional dedication they have shown in having to adapt to this new social reality and for keeping the educational process afloat under such adverse conditions.

Madrid, 27 April 2020

Nicolás Fernández Guisado

National President of ANPE (Spanish National Association of Teachers)

La Fismic Confsal Nazionale, sindacato autonomo metalmeccanici e industrie collegate, è un’organizzazione sindacale autonoma che rappresenta i lavoratori dipendenti dell’industria e dei servizi, i pensionati, i disoccupati ed i precari ed è presente su tutto il territorio nazionale.

Of course dominated by the current Corona crisis, the 2020 World Day for Safety and Health at Work has been placed under the title ‘In the face of a pandemic’.

And we really are in the face of a pandemic.

Some months ago, hardly anybody could have imaged the situation we currently find ourselves in. Tens of thousands of deaths, the economy paralysed, millions of jobs at risk or already lost, entire sectors down, maybe irreversibly.

The public services and their staff, above all health professionals, working beyond their limits; many of whom also infecting and dying themselves.

What remains surprising for me (as a non-expert!) is that I would have expected mechanisms and crisis scenarios in place, at least insistent warnings, of what was to come. At least eventually.

Given the crisis evolution in China, what were we, me included (!), (not) thinking? That China was far away? That our societies, our health systems, our ‘Western way of life’ would make us less vulnerable?

I don’t like finger-pointing, I never liked it. We are all in the same boat. And I can imagine how immensely difficult it must have been to chose between (at that time potentially hysterically) alarmism and (at that moment apparently thoughtful and well-reflected) appeasement.

But yet: It remains inexplicable to me why policy makers and authorities did not see it coming. How many of us still spoke about the virus as causing solely “light flus”, of being “most likely inoffensive” or of being “harmless” for us in Europe (or in the US)?

How did we come to the situation that we had not stocked sufficient protective gear for professionals managing the crisis and exposed to the virus, above all healthcare workers? How did we become so over-dependent on third countries on essential and live-saving gear?

Having had months and weeks for at least some sort of premonition…

Not only businesses and our societies and freedoms, but also workers and public sector staff are now paying a very high price for this lack of foresight. But also for enduring austerity, underinvestment and over-zealous privatisations of public services and healthcare.

This is something we need to reflect upon about today on this annual World Day for Safety and Health at Work.

Beyond the now urgently needed hasty (short-term) measures to protect workforces, citizens and professionals exposed to the virus, we will soon need to talk policy and administration accountabilities and how to prevent in the future what is happening today.

For us at CESI, it is clear what this means: A functioning European pandemic early-warning system, an efficient and streamlined European crisis management framework which all Member States adhere to, and above all, investments of a very large scale in the personnel, equipment and facilities of our healthcare and public services – in order to make them and our societies resilient and crisis-proof.

The emphasis here is on investment, not on costs, because, as we currently all witness, this expenditure is clearly cheaper in the long-run than trying to fix problems as we to right now.

We do not want an overmighty state and a public hand interfering in what we, as free individuals, can deliver and manage – we do not want to be deprived of our freedoms, our responsibility, maturity and accountability as individual citizens.

But where private services have not delivered -and focused only on profit-, and where this profit-mindedness led to the demise of the general interest, to rethink our societal models, including the eventuality of recommunalisation of certain services cannot remain a taboo either.

The Legislative Decree has introduced various provisions relating to teachers and all the other workers employed in schools. Among others, urgent measures have been taken for the start of the next school year, related also to contracts and recruitments, rankings and national competitions.

Since this year´s recruitment and ranking processes and procedure may be halted due to the COVID-19 crisis, neither improvements of existing-working contracts nor additional recruitments may occur.

In addition, clarifications have been made on the temporary suspension of public competitions, including teachers, and school staff hiring processes.

In Europe, it is clear that school and university are not among the priorities of Phase 2, at least this appears from the EU proposals currently in the making. Ministers still discuss the closure of the current school year and the final exams, while Italy and the Government have already modified them.

In some countries, students will return to school before May 18th: for example, France ruled that a gradual return will take place as early as May 11th, classrooms will open for children also in Denmark and Norway and a similar plan is also envisaged for Spain and Germany.

ANIEF President Marcello Pacifico stated: “Schools are not industrial production sites. For us, the school year -intended as a usual face-to-face activity- can be declared officially closed. From now on, it is worth improving the techniques and capacities of “distance and remote learning methods” as much as we can, while taking care of the current contractual rules, also trying to avoid unequal treatment due to digital devices. It will also be of major relevance to try to encourage and assist pupils to improve their studying possibilities through an improved organisation of the final exams in high schools and the adoption of clear methods in accordance with Law Decree n. 22 – which aims precisely at dealing with the Coronavirus emergency within the school system”.

Until the beginning of May, travels remain limited, all non-essential production activities are banned, and schools remain closed. The workers who are at risk now are those who cannot keep a sufficient distance from other individuals or those who are still working in crowded places. Therefore, the risks remain high for the entire school sector, in particular for pupils, teachers and the staff all: the classrooms are by fact, one of the first meeting places.

ANIEF believes that the Ministry of Education should make every effort to establish clear rules on the end of the current school year, being aware that the likelihood to return to the classroom before 18th May is low. As a trade union, ANIEF has also consistently highlighted the urgent needs to proceed with new recruitments processes and to fight precarious working conditions among teachers. Its efforts are producing first effects: the Education Minister Azzolina recently stated that “to avoid that hundreds of thousands of workers physically proceed to schools to apply for jobs, we should rather accelerate the hiring processes – via useful rankings -, by digitizing the system”.

We recall that the current teachers’ rankings were established more than 20 years ago only to manage short and occasional school replacements. Today however, these rankings are used to assign tens of thousands of teachers’ annual replacements.

To solve this huge problem, many workers are hired on precarious terms, so that e.g. after 24 months of services their contracts remain atypical and on a fixed-term. ANIEF has consistently deplored that if such workers are qualified for teaching, they must be granted typical permanent contracts and roles. Hence, the currently applicable “teachers’ ranking system” must finally be recognized as a procedure for permanent recruitment too.

“We are constantly preparing and presenting new proposals to change the School Decree in this direction”, Marcello Pacifico said. “As of this upcoming September, we strongly believe that hiring processes must go this way, otherwise we will witness another record of teachers’ substitutes and precarious workers in the school world.”

Over the past months and years, ANIEF has become the mouthpiece for a very high number of precarious workers in the education sector. It has fought countless battles against wrong hiring processes and precarious contracts, on the one hand, and for safety at school, on the other hand.

ANIEF will always be on the side of the workers.

Germany has 16 federal states (‘Bundesländer’), each with its own police force in addition to the Federal police and the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) at the national level. Thus, there are not only different responsibilities in Germany, but also different rules, regulations and consequences. This article therefore only provides a rough overview of the situation, without claiming to be exhaustive and without going into more nuanced specificities.

With regard to the overall situation: The Federal Republic of Germany is portrayed in the police Coronavirus strategy as a ‘patchwork’ in terms of service practice (organizational aspects), deployment arrangements and personnel planning.

Occupational safety and health (OSH) measures:

The police have also been affected by the general problems connected with the procurement of protective equipment, such as so-called ‘infection protection kits’ (respiratory, eye and hand protection, disinfectants, protective gowns and disposable shoe covers). However, these kits are now available. Leaflets have been made on how to use these kits and communication portals for the police medical service have been set up. The use of personal protection equipment (PPE) is case-related but is largely left up to the discretion of the police officers. While officers from the national police force generally wear face masks during border controls, currently there are no orders for police officers from federal forces (at the ‘Bundesland’ level) to wear these masks at all times.

Risk groups within the police forces (e.g. older colleagues, employees with pre-existing medical conditions etc.) are given assignments involving a lower degree of risk, if possible. Pregnant women are not allowed to come into work – working remotely, i.e. from home is possible. Police officers that have been in contact with persons infected with the Coronavirus are sent home for self-isolation and are subject to further observation. Those who have been infected with the Coronavirus while on duty benefit from accident protection measures in accordance with the relevant regulations.

Service practice/organization:

Discussions and police force meetings are currently only held via video link or conference call. Arrangements for working from home have been established, where possible. To this end, additional laptops and computers have been procured and the appropriate technical requirements have been put in place. Since it is not possible to work from home in the police patrol and criminal investigation services (with a few exceptions), permanent patrol or investigation teams are formed, if possible, with the aim of minimizing the risk of infection and, more precisely, the spread of the disease in departments. Where necessary, duty rosters and working time models are modified, even if this means straying from the working time guidelines.

Training and ongoing training:

Classical training and ongoing training at police schools and academies have been suspended. Police trainees are given e-learning assignments. All relevant information on the Coronavirus situation or important relevant police issues are included on the police intranet.

Effects on traffic and crime:

Due to the restrictions placed on the population and the entry and exit bans, the number of police cases has decreased. Police deployment and inspection arrangements are determined within the respective organizations but have generally been reduced to a strict minimum.

Violations of Coronavirus restrictions are punished consistently, but at the same time, police officers are required to follow their intuition. Due to different legal interpretations of various bans, police action may well be subject to later judicial review in many cases.

Police union work:

The regular meetings of the union bodies in the first quarter of the year were cancelled. Board and committee meetings are held, if necessary, via video link or conference call. The offices of our unions are also working from home to the extent possible.

Representatives of police unions are frequently interviewed by the media on current relevant police issues or problems.

Hermann Benker

Vice President

CESI Trade Council ‘Security’ (SEC)

While the SURE programme is planned to be tied to labour market impacts of the Corona crisis and is scheduled to be of temporary nature, its objective and rationale is in fact similar to a permanent European Unemployment Reinsurance Scheme which the European Commission has already been working on prior to the current crisis and which will likely remain on the table thereafter as well.

In its proposal, the European Commission suggests that the EU provide loans backed by joint Member State guarantees to the individual Member States. These Member States would then benefit from the EU’s strong credit rating and low borrowing costs.

The Member States would need to request financial aid to the European Commission, which would then consult with the Member State in question to verify the extent of public expenditure. This would help the European Commission evaluate the terms of the loan.

The European Commission would then present a proposal to the Council. Once approved it would be regarded as a loan from the EU to that particular Member State. This mechanism would only be put into practice once all Member States have a functioning system of guarantees.

While SURE would be designed to enable the Member States to further increase public expenditure to protect jobs, it would also help small businesses and SMEs without new projects and work (and hence no revenue) survive the crisis, helping them to overcome the first impact of an economic shock by alleviating financial liquidity difficulties.

The most common example under the SURE programme would be companies ordering their staff to work in short-time schemes, hence reducing working hours and company pay, with the state stepping in to cover the rest of the salary of the hours not worked – or at least a significant share of the rest.

This would prevent affected companies from declaring bankruptcy due to lacking liquidity while maintaining its staff. The workers, on their side, would continue to receive wages and avoid facing unemployment or personal financial issues in the household.

The promotion of short-time work schemes, is inspired by the experiences made in Germany with the so-called ‘Kurzarbeit’; a tool which seems potentially appropriate to respond o the economic impact of the Corona-crisis.

German trade unions have been largely supportive of such schemes in the past and now: According to Ulrich Silberbach, President of the German Civil Service Federation dbb, “State-sponsored short-time work has brought Germany through the [last] global financial crisis without major job losses. It is therefore also now, in the Corona crisis, an important instrument to secure employment and to support companies that would, despite being competitive, disappear from the market. Short-time work makes an important contribution to the social security and the income of employees and thus contributes significantly to the maintenance of economic demand overall.”

The Eurogroup, composed of the finance ministers of the Eurozone, backed the idea of the scheme in principle at its meeting on April 9. On April 16, the Eurogroup expressed its commitment to SURE and to proceed the negotiations with the Commission. The initiative currently awaits approval by the Council, who still has to decide on the details of the scope, execution and control of the scheme.

Unsere Gesellschaft steht vor großen Herausforderungen, die weder am nächsten Garten- noch am nächsten Grenzzaun haltmachen. Dies zeigt sich nicht nur in der derzeitigen Krise rund um COVID-19, welche die Mitgliedstaaten der Europäischen Union in ihrer Härte zwar nicht in gleichem Maße trifft, sich aber dennoch auf das öffentliche Leben in ganz Europa drastisch auswirkt. Dass gewisse Herausforderungen eine europäische Antwort bedürfen, zeigt sich ebenfalls in vielerlei anderer Hinsicht.Der Bildungssektor ist hierfür nicht erst seit Corona ein frappierendes Beispiel.
Überall in der Union lernen unsere Kinder in mehr oder weniger maroden und schlecht ausgestatteten Schulen. In allen Mitgliedstaaten wird gleichermaßen händeringend nach Fachkräften gesucht, die unsere Bildungssysteme schlichtweg nicht mehr hervorbringen. Die Digitalisierung aller unserer Lebensbereiche erfordert den Erwerb neuer und anderer Kenntnisse und Fähigkeiten. In den Schulcurricula wird dem bisher in den wenigsten Mitgliedstaaten wirklich Beachtung geschenkt. Für viele Unionsbürger ist es zudem mittlerweile zur Normalität geworden, in der ganzen EU zu leben, zu studieren und zu arbeiten. Dass die grenzüberschreitende Anerkennung von Bildungsabschlüssen dieser Tatsache oftmals im Wege steht, ist mehr als bedauerlich.

Bildungspolitische Herausforderungen machen nicht mehr an Landesgrenzen halt. Deshalb ergibt es nur Sinn, der Bildungspolitik auf EU-Ebene mehr Beachtung zu schenken.

Die EU-Kommission hat dies glücklicherweise erkannt und vor zwei Jahren das Vorhaben formuliert, bis 2025 einen sogenannten europäischen Bildungsraum zu schaffen. Bildung soll als Motor für Beschäftigung, Wachstum und soziale Gerechtigkeit genutzt werden. Die Kommission möchte in diesem Sinn unter anderem darauf hinwirken, dass es eine Garantie auf qualitativ hochwertige frühkindliche Erziehung gibt, dass jeder Abiturient mindestens zwei Fremdsprachen gut beherrscht, dass Bildungs- und Berufsabschlüsse automatisch über Ländergrenzen hinweg anerkannt werden, es eine bessere Zusammenarbeit bei der Ausarbeitung von Lehrplänen gibt sowie lebenslanges Lernen und damit Fort- und Weiterbildungen stärker gefördert werden.

Ziele formulieren ist das eine, deren Umsetzung das andere. Denn seit der Ankündigung ist leider nicht viel passiert. Grundvoraussetzung für die Umsetzung vieler der von der Kommission formulierten Pläne sind vor allen Dingen Investitionen in Bildung durch die Mitgliedstaaten. Bei allem Respekt vor der Tatsache, dass Bildungspolitik nach wie vor vor allem Sache der Mitgliedsstaaten ist: Was spräche dagegen, dass sich diese darauf verständigen, 10 Prozent ihres jeweiligen Brutto-Inlandsprodukts in die Bildung und Ausbildung junger Menschen zu investieren (der EU-Durchschnitt liegt im Moment bei 5 Prozent)?

Neben notwendigen Investitionen in die Bildungsinfrastruktur ist es notwendig, den Fokus verstärkt auf die Aus- und Fortbildung von Lehreinnen und Lehrern zu legen. Deren Rolle hat die EU-Kommission in der Debatte um den europäischen Bildungsraum bisher allerdings wenig Beachtung geschenkt.

Qualitativ hochwertige Bildung ist nur mit ausreichendem und gut ausgebildetem Lehrpersonal zu erreichen – in der Stadt und auf dem Land, aber auch fächerspezifisch. Ein Mangel an Lehrpersonal, egal ob in Fächern wie Mathematik, Informatik, Naturwissenschaften und Technik oder Kunst und Musik, welcher sich in vielen Mitgliedsstaaten verstärkt manifestiert, ist nicht hinnehmbar – weder für die Schülerinnen und Schüler, noch für die Lehrerinnen und Lehrer, welche sich mit Überstunden und Ihnen fachuntypischen Unterrichtseinheiten konfrontiert sehen. Der Lehrerberuf sollte daher dringend attraktiver gestaltet werden, um Lehrermangel zu bekämpfen. Die Rede ist vor allem von besseren Arbeitsbedingungen und besserer Entlohnung. Lehrerinnen und Lehrern verdienen darüber hinaus aber auch mehr soziale Anerkennung – insbesondere von Seiten der Eltern. Ich hoffe, dass wir alle aufgrund der Schulschließungen wegen COVID-19 merken, welch wichtige Rolle das Lehrpersonal in unserem Alltag spielt.

Zwar ist es unabdingbar, den Lehrerberuf attraktiver zu machen, aber das allein reicht nicht. Lehrerinnen und Lehrer müssen sowohl in ihrer Ausbildung als auch im Rahmen von Fortbildungen auf neue soziale Herausforderungen wie beispielsweise die Zunahme von multikulturellen Klassen und inklusivem Unterricht vorbereitet werden. Daneben müssen Schulen in zusätzliches qualifiziertes Personal wie Integrationshelfer und Schulpsychologen investieren, um die Lehrkräfte zu entlasten.

Auch die Digitalisierung verlangt unseren Lehrerinnen und Lehrern viel ab. Die diesbezüglichen Erwartungen an die Lehrkräfte sowohl seitens der Politik als auch seitens der Eltern sind enorm. So sollen sie unsere Kinder über die Risiken und Chancen des Internets aufklären sowie die Möglichkeiten, die der digitale Wandel dem Bildungssystem eröffnet, zum Vorteil unserer Kinder nutzen und digitale Lernmethoden in den Unterricht integrieren. In Zeiten von Corona sollen sie gleich ihren gesamten Unterricht ins Internet verlagern, in den meisten Fällen ohne dass die Schulen über die dafür notwendige Infrastruktur verfügen, geschweige denn, dass sich die Betroffenen im Vorhinein mit einer solchen Art des Unterrichtens vertraut machen konnten.

Sowohl die Sensibilisierung von Lehrkräften für das Thema als auch die Verwendung und richtige Einbindung digitaler Lernmedien im Schulalltag bleiben hinter den Erwartungen zurück. Wir benötigen daher Konzepte, die Lehrenden Medienkompetenz vermitteln und ihnen Orientierung geben, wie sie unter ihren Schülerinnen und Schülern einen kritischen Umgang mit Medien fördern können.

Der zunehmende Fokus auf digitale Bildung darf meines Erachtens aber nicht zu Lasten der sozialen Beziehung zwischen Lehrkräften und Lernenden gehen. Sie trägt immens zur persönlichen Entwicklung der Schülerinnen und Schüler bei. Sozialkompetenzen werden in Zukunft sicherlich genauso von Bedeutung sein wie digitale Fertigkeiten. Online-Klassenräume und ausschließlich individualisiertes Lernen über Tablet-Computer stellen keine langfristige Alternative dar.

Im Hinblick auf das Meistern der aktuellen bildungspolitischen Herausforderungen steigen Verantwortung und Anforderungen an das Lehrpersonal also zunehmend – nicht nur in Deutschland, nicht nur in Frankreich, sondern in ganz Europa. Die EU-Kommission sollte deshalb unbedingt konkretisieren, inwiefern sie Lehrerinnen und Lehrer besser unterstützen will. Mit Spannung erwarten wir im Europäischen Parlament daher die für den Herbst angekündigte Mitteilung der Kommission zum Europäischen Bildungsraum, in der Hoffnung auf die dringend notwendigen Konkretisierungen und Umsetzungsschritte. Denn Fakt ist: in politischen Zeitrechnungen ist 2025 bereits morgen und ohne die Lehrerinnen und Lehrer werden wir unsere Zielsetzungen nicht erreichen können – ohne sie ist kein europäischer Bildungsraum zu machen!

The virus is present in a large number of countries, where it is having, and will continue to have, a devastating impact.

What is certain is that life will never be the same again. Coronavirus leaves terrible scars on both the individual and society as a whole and has become a great indicator of the situation in all spheres of society. It is now visible and, in the immediate future, will be viewed as a way to evaluate what we have done so far and how much politics has influenced all developments.

What has definitely become clear is that, as the family is the basic core of society, the worker is the basic core of economics.

The worker, irrespective of profession, has shown his true place and importance in this situation and proved who we can rely on.

Depressed, humiliated, underpaid, lacking basic human and professional rights in many countries, constrained by politics and various legal acts, this worker rises from the ashes and shows us the direction we should take.

It is now evident that all our work and efforts, the struggle for that worker and the battle within the organisations that operate to make sure he enjoys a better future, is not in vain and gives us the strength to continue working, ensuring he reaches the position he deserves. In order to be able to do this, we must come up with solutions and strive for equality in the future, forget about our mutual tensions and differences, not forgetting everything that has been achieved so far, but understanding the importance of each individual and work to stand up for his rights and guarantee him a better socio-economic status.

Allow me, as a representative of my frontline workers, who selflessly give themselves to everyone else, to welcome and support everyone else wishing to stay in good health and a enjoy as better future for themselves and their families.

Trade Union of Doctors of Medicine of Republika Srpska

Miodrag Femić, PhD

Our society is facing major challenges that don’t end at the next border fence, whether that be with our neighbour or neighbouring country. This is not just apparent in the present COVID-19 crisis, the severity of which is not affecting all the EU’s Member States to the same extent, but which is having a drastic effect on public life across Europe. The fact that certain challenges require a European response can also be witnessed in many other respects.The education sector is a striking example, as it was pre-corona.

Throughout the Union, our children are being educated in rather dilapidated and poorly equipped schools. In all Member States, a desperate search is on for skilled workers that our education systems simply do not bring forward anymore.

The digitisation of all areas of our lives requires the acquisition of new and different knowledge and skills. However, school curricula in the vast majority of Member States have so far devoted very little attention to this. In addition, it has also become normal for many EU citizens to live, study and work throughout the EU. The fact that the cross-border (non-) recognition of qualifications and diplomas is often an obstacle to this is highly regrettable.

Challenges in educational policy no longer stop at the border of a region or a Member State. For this reason, it seems only sensible to pay more attention to education policy at EU level.

Fortunately, the European Commission has recognised this and, two years ago, outlined its intention to create a so-called European Education Area by 2025. The aim is to use education as a driver for employment, growth and social justice. With this in mind, the Commission wishes, inter alia, to do its part to ensure that quality early childhood education is guaranteed, every high school graduate can communicate to a good level in at least two foreign languages, educational and vocational qualifications are automatically recognised across borders, there is more effective cooperation when it comes to drawing up curricula, and that lifelong learning, and thus further education and training, is more strongly.

Setting goals is one thing, implementing them quite another. After all, sadly, not a great deal has happened since the announcement. The fundamental prerequisite for the implementation of many of the plans laid out by the Commission is, above all, investment in education by the Member States.

With all due respect to the fact that education policy remains primarily a Member State issue, one has to ask: why don’t the Member States invest 10 per cent of their respective GDPs in educating and training young people (presently, the EU average stands at 5 per cent)?

Alongside necessary investments in educational infrastructure, greater focus needs to be placed on training and further training for teachers. However, the European Commission has so far paid little attention to their role in the debate about the European Education Area.

High-quality education can only be achieved with sufficient, well-trained teaching staff – in urban and rural areas alike, but also in terms of specific subjects. A lack of teaching staff, whether this be in subjects like mathematics, IT, science and technology or art and music, which is becoming increasingly apparent in many member states, is unacceptable – both for the pupils, and for the teachers, who are being lumped with overtime and lessons which are not typical of their subject.

There’s thus an urgent need to make the teaching profession more attractive, in order to combat the lack of teachers. This means above all better working conditions and better pay. However, teachers also deserve more social recognition – particularly from parents. I hope that the COVID-19 related school closures make us all take note of the important role played by teaching staff in our day-to-day lives.

It’s true that it’s crucial that we make the teaching profession more attractive, but that alone won’t cut it. As part of their training, as well as in further training, teachers must be helped to prepare for new social challenges like the increase in multicultural classes and inclusive teaching. Alongside this, schools need to invest in additional qualified staff like integration assistants and school psychologists in order to ease the load placed on the teachers.

Digitisation also demands a lot from our teachers. Here, the expectations on the part of politicians as well as parents directed at the teachers are enormous. They are expected to educate our children on the risks and opportunities of the internet, to make use of all the possibilities provided by the digital change in a way that benefits our children, by integrating digital learning methods in the class rooms. In times of COVID-19, they are expected to transfer their entire courses onto the net, mostly without the schools possessing the required infrastructure, let alone having the opportunity to familiarise themselves with this kind of teaching in advance.

People expect more when it comes to teachers being aware of the topic, as well as to how they apply digital teaching methods in everyday school life. This is why we need concepts aiming to provide teachers with sufficient digital skills and guide them as to the ways in which they can promote a critical approach to media amongst their pupils.

However, the increasing focus on digital education must not, in my view, be at the cost of social relations between teachers and learners, as those contribute enormously to the pupils’ personal development. In the future, social skills will surely be as important as digital know-how. Online classrooms and exclusively individualised learning using tablets do not amount to a long-term alternative.

When it comes to mastering the current challenges in the field of education policy, therefore, we can see that teachers are taking on ever more responsibilities and being asked to dig deeper and deeper – not just in Germany or France, but across Europe. This is why the European Commission must, as a matter of urgency, spell out how it intends to support teachers better.

We in the European Parliament therefore eagerly await the Commission’s communication on the European Education Area announced for the autumn, in the hope that the much needed concretisations will be made and further steps in the implementation will be taken. After all, it’s a fact: in political time, 2025 is tomorrow and without teachers, we won’t be able to reach our targets – without our teachers, there is no European Education Area!

In a commentary recently published by the European Policy Centre, the authors, Claire Dhéret and Simona Guagliardo, argue that the EU and its member states must learn from the current pandemic if they are to improve their health systems and build up their resilience before the next one hits. Their ability to draw the lessons of this crisis will determine their resilience to address future pandemics.

While the EU has very limited competences in the area of health, it can still support a more equal development of health systems’ resilience across Europe. To do so, two key lessons need to be drawn. Firstly, the EU needs to exclude social investment from future public deficit calculations. Secondly, the EU must make the convergence of working conditions a key objective of the Single Market, with a specific focus on health professionals.

Full article available here: http://www.epc.eu/en/Publications/Boosting-Europes-resilience~3160a0

Authors’ contact details:

Claire Dhéret; [email protected]

Simona Guagliardo; [email protected]

Until now, in the European debate, contrasts between so-called rigorist countries and the south of Europe have prevailed. Beyond flags, we believe that at this stage, a common sense of providing Europe with a collective economic and social commitment as well as common health care, capable of putting in place ordinary and extraordinary tools to support recovery, must prevail.

So far significant measures have been taken and tax measures are multiplying. The anti-European sentiment and a dangerous underestimation of the measures taken until now by Brussels and Frankfurt must be overcome. Europe is there, it exists, it is effective, it is flexible, it is fast and, while not yet doing everything it could do, it has already done a lot to avoid some European countries from falling on hard times.

The European Commission, in less than a month, reviewed the state aid rules; set up a first € 37 billion investment fund to provide liquidity for small businesses; proposed to use every single euro of the European Union budget for policies aimed at protecting the lives of its fellow citizens; launched a one hundred billion euro (Sure) support initiative to mitigate unemployment risks in the event of an emergency; proposed to redirect all available structural funds to respond to the crisis generated by the coronavirus; applied full flexibility to tax rules; suspended budget discipline rules and created a potential bazooka worth € 2.770 billion, more than the US $ 2 billion.

To these amounts, we must also add other precious resources which are strategic, crucial and vital. Those that come from the other guardian angels of Europe, such as the ECB: to the 120 billion of Quantitative Easing already planned until the end of the year, it has flanked and additional 750 which will allow for substantial purchases of debts issued by member states and their respective companies; and like Bei which will present a proposal to the Eurogroup for the creation of a guarantee fund that will allow European companies to offer liquidity for investments up to around 200 billion.

Are these measures sufficient? Of course not, but the populist view like Trump’s must be overcome and further interventions must be targeted to support an economy that has been stagnant for over a month and which, at the time of recovery, will have to deal with giants such as the Us and China.

Marshall plans are currently being discussed at the Eurogroup, but in order to be successful, the reconstruction plan must, first of all, have dimensions comparable to those implemented by China and the USA and have flexible financing instruments for businesses, both for small and big. A plan capable of favouring solutions to European giants in order to face crisis and technological transformation effectively and win the global competition.

In recent days, the European Commission has launched an instrument (SURE), funded with 100 billion that can effectively deal with the employment emergency, approved by all governments. Well, that instrument can be enhanced, it is able to issue guarantee bonds (Coronabond and European Bond) and it could overcome the ongoing ideological debate giving perspective to the European economy in view of the recovery. But this is not enough, the proposal of an Esm without conditions could be fine. A new type of unconditional Esm instrument could pave the way for the ECB’s role as lender of last resort of a government in difficulty for the pandemic. 240 billion euros that will be accessible to States unconditionally, this for Italy could mean an additional 36 billion to improve the national health safety network put to the test by COVID-19.

Furthermore, the discussion is open to launching an extraordinary plan of 500 billion that the EU has allocated through various tools to overcome the economic crisis and which, in our opinion, should be guaranteed by the issue of European assurance funds. This must happen because we are in an exceptional moment which we must face with exceptional interventions.

Therefore, we suggest strengthening the existing tools, starting from SURE to give European people the financial strength necessary to overcome an unprecedented crisis. The fate of hundreds of millions of men and women exhausted by the pandemic, as well as industries, is at stake. We, Italians, must be aware that without the EU the road to recovery would be even more difficult. But the EU must be equally aware that without Italy, it would not exist. This is what is at stake. Rulers should put away the cross vetoes dictated by childish political reasoning and face the dramatic phase with measures capable of making a qualitative leap forward for the whole old Continent, also taking advantage of the new 2021/2027 European multiannual budget in order to mobilize large financial resources that could be used to truly make a ‘Europe of peoples’ and not of big finance.

Roberto Di Maulo
CESI Vice-President
FISMIC Confsal Secretary-General

“A few months ago the world saw what was happening in China as something distant that we would never live in our country, much less in our day to day, in our hospitals, in our families, much less what happened to our colleagues, and for sure to ourselves, because it always seems to us that misfortunes happen only to others, until one day the first coronavirus positive case appears in your country, and even so, you still see it far away because the responsible experts who should have foreseen it do not take it seriously. Then every day the number of cases rise, one here, another one there, but in two weeks everything goes haywire and the hospital emergencies begin to fill with sick people, so many of them that you even have to assist them on the floor of the corridors because there is no more room to put them in. So you have the impression that this is not your life, that what you are living seems like a science fiction movie, until you start to see how your classmates start to fall ill and you realize that this is for real. We realize that we are in a silent, but cruel war that they have sent us without ammunition, without the adequate Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) so that the damn coronavirus does not defeat us. It feels like they have deceived us all.

We have seen how protocols have been changed from time to time in order to “justify” the lack of PPEs, while professionals and the generous population invented some forms of PPEs from garbage bags and with everything that was thought to protect us at all cost, without being able to move or almost breathe.

Meanwhile, every day when I wake up, I keep thinking that it was a bad dream, but soon I come back to reality, because I discover that I am afraid, much more, if possible than yesterday, because every day people I care for are dying. And although in our profession we are used to dealing with disease and death, this damn COVID still makes death even more cruel because it adds a perfidious and horrifying ingredient – loneliness. It is horrible and painful to see patients, most of them elderly, lonely and scared, without the comfort of their loved ones. Isolated, as if they were plagued, with the only consolation that we professionals provide some form of care. They are scared, us too, although we try to hide it because at the moment we are everything to them, that’s why I draw strength from the depths of me and a smile hidden behind my mask that I try to perceive in the happy tone of my voice or in my eyes, also hidden behind that home screen that the good anonymous people have donated to us in the absence of the real ones (those that they say they have asked from China, but which never arrived because of the incompetence of those who should protect us). Meanwhile, the number of deaths is increasing every day and the number of patients reaching the hospital emergency room is increasing. We do not know where to put more beds, the consultation rooms have been turned into ICUs, the corridors are equipped with armchairs, the gymnasiums are filled with beds, it seems that we are in a war although without bombings or bloody patients.

Every day, after devastating shifts of 10 to 12 hours, using the precarious improvised protective equipment in the absence of the real ones, you feel even more afraid if possible, because you might have been infected and because you might take the virus to your house where your children are waiting for you, or your elderly and delicate parents or your husband who also has health problems and then you run to the shower to rub your entire body as if you wanted to tear off your skin. Then when you get home and want more than ever the hug of yours, for fear of infecting them, you just say hello from afar and you run to take off your clothes to put it in the washing machine and you go to bed because the next day you have to come back. That is why there is no more right for days off and they even had to hire students to make up for the lack of sufficient staff.

The saddest thing of all is the ethical one: despite the fact that the Spanish army set up in record time hospital facilities in exhibition halls, sports centers, gyms, and so on, due to lack of sufficient respirators, it has been necessary to choose who to save and who not to. Unfortunately, our elders, the most vulnerable, those who have struggled so much in their lives so that we have everything to thank for until today, we had lost.

However, this war is revealing great things that have been forgotten lately due to the superficiality of having a lot of everything and feeling with many “false” entitlements. It has been revealed that although in a society we are all necessary, some are more necessary than others: the health professionals who used to be mistreated and assaulted, often with words but sometimes also physically, are now the “angels” or “heroes” who are being applauded every evening at eight from all the balconies and windows in all corners of Spain. Today more than ever I feel proud of my profession because I feel valued and respected as never before, hoping that when all this ends, they will continue to value me and recognize what until now it cost many to recognize. Although on the other hand, my sadness increases every day because there are already many colleagues infected, sick, isolated in their homes or in hospitals. Five technical colleagues in the nursing care unit, a nurse and several doctors have already died, all because we do not work with the appropriate security measures that they promote. To make matters worse they do not test us, which increases our fear and spreads the contagions.

As for the disease, we are learning a lot and very quickly. We have observed that when our patients start having respiratory distress, if they are lucky to control it and to get intubated in time, sedate them to calm down and if they do not have previous pathologies, they usually come out ahead, although some die very quickly. We have had cases that have entered the emergency rooms by their own feet and had died within five hours. The profile of these are usually men older than 70 years with a certain degree of obesity and some previous pathology, but there are also younger people with no previous pathologies who have serious difficulties; experts say that the form of the disease depends on the viral load to which they have been exposed.

Some recommendations have also been described to avoid that professionals suffering from certain pathologies are not in the front line of fire, such as those who suffer from:

• Diabetes;
• Cardiovascular disease, including hypertension;
• Chronic liver disease;
• Chronic lung disease;
• Chronic kidney disease;
• Immunodeficiency;
• Cancer in active treatment phase;
• Pregnancy;
• Over 60 years;

In conclusion, it is incredible that in the time we live in high technology, advances, discoveries and research in medicine, a miserable virus is responsible for so many deaths, it has confined billions of people, ultimately to the entire world and that it is responsible for a global human and economic catastrophe from which we do not know how we can recover, which will mark a before and after both on the material and spiritual sides.

Data concerning COVID19 cases in Spain on the 7th of April 2020

Confirmed cases: 140510

In intensive care: 7069

Deaths: 13793

Recovered: 43208″

These testimonies underline the systemic problems our European societies had to deal with sooner than later, why today they are in such jeopardy and what has been missing: investment in the workforce, reallocation of funding for public social services, fair and good working conditions for the most important professions in society.

CESI publishes these testimonies in hope that once the crisis is over all these issues can be addressed and that a new societal order will be established with fair and safe working conditions for everyone as the building block of such a construction!

A nurse from FANO, Ancona, shares with us: “Today you call us heroes but the PPE (personal protective equipment), which we should have to work safely, in many realities is scarce and you work with what is there, even if not suitable: an example is the FFP2 / FFP3 masks, replaced in almost every activity surgical masks (which, I want to clarify, are not PPE but medical devices, a big difference!) and, moreover, even those now almost impossible to find and replaced with improvised “masks” with materials probably good at most for dusting at home.

(…) Do not take me as venal because, and I think this applies to all my colleagues, we are not interested in receiving anything more on this specific occasion. What we would like is a contract that always reflects our work and our professionalism! Every day we carry out advanced resuscitation manoeuvres together with our medical colleagues, we are trained to know how to use infusion pumps, defibrillators, monitors, machinery for invasive and non-invasive lung ventilation, yet we do not have a critical area allowance. Every day we are exposed to people potentially affected by diseases, due to the most varied viral or bacterial microorganisms (MTC, HIV, HCV, HBV, meningitis, pneumonia, and a myriad of other pathogens that would be too long to list) who expose us to the risk of developing diseases such as tuberculosis, hepatitis, AIDS, meningitis, and so on up to this COVID-19, yet we do not have an infectious disease allowance. Every day, when we carry out triage activities, to assign, with an evaluation that lasts just over a minute, a priority code to the hundreds of people who access our emergency room daily, we expose ourselves to the risk of errors that could also have consequences serious for patients. Yet we do not have a specific allowance for this delicate activity.

Today you call us heroes but every day, until just over two weeks ago, we were the workers most at risk of aggression than any other category of workers. “

Lorenzo Grazioli, Anesthesiologist, tells us: “My day starts at 7.30 am, at 9 am I reconnaissance all Intensive Therapies, which are now all Covid. We have reached 80 beds. Every day I take stock of how many intubated people are and then I manage the clinic. My day ends around 8 and 9 evening. The patient case history is a broad case study, here there are many infected patients and we have a huge number in Intensive Care. I collaborate more with Intensive Care Nurses and Perfusionists as regards the management of extracorporeal support. I feel very tired, I work with a madman, but none of us draws back “, to the Grazioli citizens he sends a piece of advice:” People must stay at home so as to block the infection, we are already at the limit: if we exceed this limit it is really a big problem”.

Nicola, 26 years old, resuscitation nurse in a COVID-19 sector, testifies: “I am afraid to return home to infect parents and grandparents”. In just a few days, its operating unit was transformed into COVID-19 Resuscitation. He works on three shifts, as does the vast majority of colleagues. He explained that he is afraid, afraid to go home and harm his loved ones by infecting them. He hasn’t seen his grandparents for weeks for the same reason. Yet hie and his family are very close, they used to eat lunch or dinner together. Now it is no longer possible, he lives locked up in his bedroom. He undresses in the garage, washes himself in a bathroom near the house, he no longer has the life as before. He works and returns home, goes home to work, is often frowning, nervous, inclined to cry. “I can’t take it anymore, it’s been a month since I have ceased to live and I am busy, this is the height, to save the life of my patients in Resuscitation – Nicola explains – it’s always more difficult, it seems we live in a film. For six hours locked in a suit, without eating, without drinking. I try to do my best, I try to pay attention to details and not to make the slightest mistake. I go home and go straight to my room. I miss the hugs of my parents and my sister, I miss the smile of my grandmother and of my grandfather. I miss my dog, I miss the life I used to have, I miss my hooks, I miss arguing with colleagues, my head nurse. I miss going to the bar, I miss cycling, I miss going running and playing soccer. “

Alessandra Ziniti goes straight to the heart of the problem of our health systems: “Until yesterday, politicians and economists taught us that, due to urgent public debt reduction needs, departments, hospitals had to be closed, hiring blocked when, despite these draconian treatments, the debt increased dramatically. After decades of villainous health policy based exclusively on cuts, only now, do some politicians realize that there are no beds, no machinery, no health personnel?

Now, by virtue of those unfortunate choices, Italy has 3.4 beds/ 1000 inhabitants, well below the threshold for adequate assistance. You blocked the competitions for specialist doctors, nurses, when you realized that the Doctor is no longer a coveted profession for various reasons (inadequate remuneration for commitment, responsibilities and professional risks; inadequate social protection, even before legal of health workers, etc.), that many of us prefer to work abroad and that the competitions to fill vacant positions in the emergency rooms are deserted, now what do you do? Now run to the shelters, trying to modify the employment contract, after for decades you have favoured the culture of precariousness and the intensive exploitation of the healthcare profession (doctors, nurses, socio-health workers, laboratory technicians, pharmacists, biologists) and you treated and humiliated us like many serfs, to whom everything can be imposed (exhausting shifts, missed rest, unused holidays). You have sown the wind and now you reap a storm.

We trust that citizens will finally understand who to blame for this dramatic situation and that the national health system has ruled only and exclusively thanks to the self-denial of health personnel. To the Italian citizens who today join the thanks of the politicians, we want to remind you that we are always the same ones who are attacked in the various Italian emergency rooms. (…) We are always the same ones who are killed at night in front of the entrance to an outpatient clinic or raped during a shift on medical guard, in a remote inland country. To all of you, politicians and citizens, I ask: why and above all for what do you thank us?

Maybe because none of you would be willing to do what we do, by free choice, every day? Do you thank us because today you are afraid, afraid of getting sick and not being treated, afraid of dying without assistance, fear of not finding a bed in an intensive care unit, of not finding an anesthesiologist, a pulmonologist, an internist who will heal you from Coronavirus? Once the spotlight has gone out and the curtain has fallen for this unfortunate epidemic spotlight, what we would like is only a minimum of respect for us health professionals and for our profession; not false thanks or ritual solidarity, but only respect and understanding. Understand and respect us, this would be enough to make us understand that you understand.”

How can one sum up the last few weeks? Uncertainty, lots of questions, a dynamic state of play, challenges across the board and, in spite of everything, especially in this age of social distancing, people coming together in many places and showing solidarity to one another.

We can rely on the public sector

What does the current situation show? That we can rely on the public sector. In many areas, the public sector is keeping the country running at a time when corona is calling the shots. They run the infrastructure, meaning they are under additional pressure at a time like this. Wherever we look in this shared world of ours, it’s our colleagues who are doing their bit to ensure that people stay healthy and that public life goes on.

It’s the medical and care workers, our colleagues in health administration, crisis management, local and regional administration, the fire and rescue sectors, educators and those who maintain public order, who are responsible for making sure everything keeps running. Many are reaching their limits. For this, we owe them a debt of gratitude. But the thing they need most right now is strength, perseverance and their health. All – employees and citizens alike – must show consideration for others. The smallest act can make the biggest impact.

Working in the age of corona

The coronavirus pandemic has highlighted weaknesses. The lack of staff in many parts of the public sector is now glaringly obvious. This has been apparent for quite some time. Here, it’s time to play an active role in turning this around, once corona is behind us. Everyone ought to have registered by now how important a good, secure network of professionals is.

Something people have now grasped is this: we need to make greater strides when it comes to digitisation. This situation shows us that processes of change can be speeded up. Pretty much overnight, IT equipment and modes of digital communication were no longer a theoretical construct, but rather a reality. And it’s a reality which reveals prevailing deficits. The available infrastructure often sets limits upon mobile working, even if this style of working is definitely possible in some jobs.

Now is the time to learn from our experiences of these weeks, examine them closely, ask honest, enquiring questions – also with regard to how we can avoid a further blurring of the borders between work and rest time, and seek compatibility – and shine a light on naturally unavoidable reasons which can restrict mobile working, such as how we deal with data protection regulations. This must then give rise to measures which we in the komba trade union follow attentively and actively.

Working at the moment is an endurance test. Not everyone is able to work from home. For many, their job is no longer secure. More than ever, the labour market is facing enormous challenges. Some employers have now registered for short-term work. As wages sink, living costs remain constant for those affected by the shift to short-term work. This is why all states must top up the reduced hours compensation to cover workers’ running costs.

An arrangement for the public sector has now been reached. Collective agreements have hitherto contained no basis for short-term work. Nevertheless, the Works Constitution Act, and in some of the German Länder, staff representation acts, already make such agreements possible. This is why the present situation made a uniform, national arrangement, which also heeded the need for equality, a must. That being said, the COVID-19 collective agreement which has now been reached, and which is intended to be used as a nationwide arrangement for short-term work in the public sector, only applies to certain, pre-agreed areas and the particular case of coronavirus. Consequently, it definitely doesn’t give people a free ride for the future.

Health system: abuses are becoming glaringly obvious

Across the health and care sector, staffing is incredibly stretched. Even on a typical working day, it cannot be said that staff are well equipped and given a fair workload. Staff continue to give their all, making sure that people get what they need. Applause alone, even if they undoubtedly deserve it, is not enough. The problem in the health sector has been apparent for quite some time. In several debates over pay, we have pointed out that shortages exist in the health department; that those in charge have lost sight of what it means to be a doctor or carer. There are too many unoccupied posts in the health sector, and this is something which becomes apparent in a crisis such as this one. It is to be hoped that employers learn the right lessons from this and finally improve the income and working conditions of those working in this field.

Childcare arrangements

Those working in nurseries are currently making an important contribution towards getting through this crisis. They are looking after the children of key workers, so that infrastructure can keep running. We are keeping an eye on how safe and protected those working in childcare facilities are and are paying close attention to the rules.

What’s more, public sector employees have been having to find flexible solutions concerning childcare since the nurseries and schools closed their doors. Until now, they had been entitled to a maximum of 3 working days to look after their children. Local employers spoke up about this and now more generous provisions for leave, which go beyond the standard arrangements, are permitted.

What is going on with the 2020 pay scale developments?

Talks for those working in social care and education had only just begun. Collective bargaining rounds are due to take place in the summer for local transport and for government and local authority employees. When, and in what form, negotiations will once again be possible is a question to which no reliable answer can be given at this point in time. The collective bargaining parties remain in close contact.

Komba trade union work and coronavirus

All areas of komba trade union’s work had, until now, packed agendas. Now, all events, seminars and meetings have been called off, provisionally until the end of May. That being said, we are still manning the office – from home and on site – and we’re dealing with our members’ enquiries. Consultations on the part of the executive board also continue, albeit in a new format. Rather than gather around a table, our members recently met virtually. Naturally, the focal point of the discussion was the effect of coronavirus.

In all areas, we can see that we need to think outside the box and that we can only do so by working together. All are called upon to think collectively and act decisively in order to find solutions fit for all. This goes for the whole of Europe.

Stay well!

Andres Hemsing

National Chairman of the German komba trade union

CESI Trade Council ‘Defence’ (DEF)

The first case of COVID-19 came to our country at the end of February. Today, on April the 6th, as I write this article, there are more than 17.000 confirmed cases. Most of the people who were tested positively live in the southern province of Noord-Brabant.

Like in every other country, the actual number of COVID-19 infections in the Netherlands is likely to be higher than the number of reports as not everyone suspected of a COVID-19 infection is tested.

This extreme situation needs extreme measures to be taken.

Measures to fight the virus

Every country has chosen its own approach in the fight against the virus. The Dutch approach: maximum control of the virus (‘flattening the curve’). That should lead to a controlled spread among the groups least at risk.

Maximum control means taking measures to reduce the peak in infections and stagger those infections over a longer period. By taking this approach, one in which most people will experience only minor symptoms, the Netherlands can build population immunity and make sure that its healthcare system is able to cope.

The aim is to stop nursing homes, home care services, hospitals and, above all, intensive care units becoming overwhelmed. And to make sure they always have enough capacity to help the people who need it most.

… and the economic damage caused by it

The Dutch government has decided to implement a series of unprecedented economic measures. The measures are designed not only to protect our health, but also to protect people’s jobs and livelihoods and to minimize the impact on self-employed people, small and medium-sized enterprises and major companies.

Under the newly announced measures, billions of euros will be invested into the economy every month, for as long as necessary. The measures will ensure that companies are able to pay their employees’ wages, grant a bridging arrangement for self-employed people and allow companies to hang on to their money through relaxed tax provisions, allowances and supplemental lines of credit.[1]

Reaction of CNV to governmental measures

My reaction to the measures taken by the Dutch cabinet: ‘The emergency package announced on March 17 is enormous. And that is good. If the government does not act (and no one else can but the government), thousands of companies go bankrupt and hundreds of thousands of people lose work and income’.

My colleague, CNV chairman, Piet Fortuin, stated: ‘With this package, the cabinet offers some help to the workers in the Netherlands. A ray of light at the times of uncertainty. The cabinet gives employers 90% compensation for the continued payment of salaries. An operation of unprecedented size. The billion-dollar injection to continue to pay all salaries, which the CNV urgently requested, has been largely honored’.

But not all the workers will be able to fully profit from the measures taken, especially workers with flex contracts remain extremely vulnerable. ‘Many of them are already on the street. It is crucial that they are not left out and that they benefit from these measures’, Fortuin said.

Public services are the services of the utmost importance

This crisis has a major impact on everyone’s daily lives. Children cannot go to school, elderly may no longer see their beloved ones, social contacts at work are banned, no activities are allowed in sports associations. There will be no birthday parties with family and friends, no church services, concerts or any kind of cultural events – for an indefinite period of time. People will have to get used to ‘online’ instead of ‘live’ social contacts. The impacts are difficult to assess, but they will be deep.

The importance of the work of public services for keeping society together is now more evident than ever. Our society will only continue to function if workers employed in crucial professions can do their job.

Especially workers in government and public services, in the health and welfare sectors are of crucial importance for care, safety, crisis management, enforcement, payment of benefits, energy and electricity supply, water and waste management etc.

….especially the healthcare services

All the public sector workers nowadays are under enormous pressure. But of all the public sectors, the health sector workers are by far the most affected. My colleague, the chairwoman of health and welfare sector, Anneke Westerlaken, is in continuous dialog with the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport. The biggest problem health workers are facing is the lack of protective equipment. Mrs Westerlaken emphasizes that all possibilities must be exploited to fix this, knowing that this of course also has priority in the regions and at the Ministry.

In care institutions, time should be made available to get some sleep, eat quietly or relax. Professionals must be able to decide for themselves which administrative tasks are (temporarily) unnecessary. The Dutch cabinet acknowledges the impact on the health professionals. A motion to give healthcare personnel a bonus for their extra efforts in tackling the coronavirus received the unanimous support of the House. She has stated: ‘It’s very good that the cabinet is also showing its appreciation for the care staff in this way’.

With all measures taken, Dutch society is fighting the crisis and is on its way to recovery. But we are not there yet, not even close. It’s a long and difficult process. For the Netherlands and for the rest of the EU.

We must face this together

I believe that only if we all act together and co-operate, we will be able to overcome the challenges we are facing. The coronavirus does not take borders, languages, cultures and economies into account. As global citizens, we are all affected. In times of worry and crisis people are aware of their own vulnerability and that of their neighbours. Therefore, it’s important that all the people take care of each other, pay more attention to each other’s needs and help those in need. The whole of Europe is gripped by the pandemic. Researchers collaborate in the search for a drug or best practices in treatment. Let’s also learn and support each other as countries where possible. Cooperation is more important than ever. Therefore, the CNV supports CESI in its appeal for international solidarity.

Patrick Fey, CESI Vice-President and President of the CNV Government and Public Services

Dutch National Federation of Christian Trade Unions ‘Connectief’

The main considerations for a codification directive on administration cooperation in the field of taxation raised by CESI include the following key aspects:

• In the private and the public sectors the text of the new directive (once implemented) will be a great challenge for all employees and civil servants. They have to change from the well-known traditional text of the six directives on administrative cooperation in the field of taxation to the new codified text of the new, unifying codification directive. Therefore it is a very useful advantage that the proposal does not change the global structure of the initial directive 2011/16/EU.

• The proposal for a new codification directive on administrative cooperation in the tax area is a technical work on the administrative level, containing no new measure to strengthen the cooperation rules. Therefore CESI hopes that the proposal is not the final act of directives 0n administrative coooperation in the field of taxation, but a new efficient base for further tax cooperation actions in a more transparent way.

• In the Directive (EU) 2019/1937 on the protection of persons who report breaches of Union law, the recitals 18, 66 and 72 make reference to the exchange of information in the field of taxation and the administrative cooperation through the Directive 2011/16/EU. In this sense the present codification proposal should also mention the whistle-blower protection in the taxation field.

• Further more general problems exist in relation with tax avoidance and tax fraud that have a link to the proposal for the new Directive on administrative cooperation. For instance, by the Anti-Tax Avoidance Directive (ATAD 1 – (UE)/2016/1164) the Member States had only to implement a minimum level of protection of the internal market and aimed to achieve the essential minimum degree of coordination within the Union (recital 16). So, further, stronger actions are necessary. Moreover, by the Anti-Tax Avoidance Directive (ATAD 2 – (UE)/2017/952) the Directive ATAD 1 was amended as regards hybrid mismatches with third countries. In order to assemble a complete directive concerning entities in the Member States and permanent establishments of entities resident in third countries it would be useful in the future to propose also a codification version of the directives ATAD;

CESI’s full consultation contribution is available here. More information about the consultation and the draft directive can be accessed here.

All laws, regulations, directives or instructions must be guided by this. The economic consideration of the postal service and telecom suppliers is also subordinate to this guideline.

In CESI and Eurofedop in particular, where liberal and Christian social trade unions fight as part of a large community for better working conditions in Europe and beyond, it is, of course, difficult for us and our members to get to grips with all of these commands and bans.

Those working for the postal service and in the telecoms sector are finally getting the recognition they deserve. People can now see that, alongside health care workers, supermarket staff, refuse collectors, electricity suppliers, etc., the two professions of postal and telecoms worker also feature among those jobs which make it possible for our society to function “normally”.

And it’s in these times of social distancing in particular that we award special recognition to those trades which make sure people are able to communicate. Here post and telecoms workers are very much in demand, as they ensure that people are able to stay in contact.

As trade unions, we also have the obligation to make good on our supply mandate vis-a-vis governments. But only for as long as the employers do everything within their power to guarantee the safety of their workers.

They must fulfil their obligation to care for each and every one of us.

Sadly, as we reach the third week of the pandemic, we are still not in a position to provide the most rudimentary protective gear in the numbers and quality required across the country.

This is why CESI’s trade council ‘Post & Telecoms’ demands:

• For all workers in at-risk groups (immunocompromised, those suffering from cardiovascular disease, diabetes, cancer, etc.) to be decommissioned and for them to continue to be paid. If necessary this should be due to an order given by member state governments!
• For sufficient disinfectant, protective gloves, face masks for all and protective screens to be supplied in telecom shops and branches of the post office.
• The post and telecoms services must be cut back to what is absolutely necessary. No-one can understand why we are still delivering junk mail at a time like this!
• If a worker (and sadly, there are already many cases) tests positive for the virus, the offices should be closed until all tests are available!
• It must be guaranteed that the minimum distance can be kept to, whatever duties are being carried out. If necessary, this can be done by reorganising the way things are done.
• And the CESI Trade Council demands that this extraordinary act of service to the community must finally also be recognised financially for all those who have to work on the ‘FRONT’ on a daily basis.

Sadly, this catastrophe will be with us for many months to come. Returning to normality is utterly inconceivable at present.

Protect yourselves! Insist upon protective gear! This is about your health and that of those you love.

Stay healthy everyone! We trade unions will work tirelessly to put the required amount of pressure on governments, employers and, if necessary, the media, so as to guarantee you the greatest possible level of safety.

Trade Council ‘Post and Telecoms’ (P&T)

Corona – it’s an invisible danger, which we can’t stop at the borders, whether we’re talking about interstate borders or European borders. We also can’t stop it by isolating Europe from the rest of the world.

We could despair. Many people are despairing, of their own apparent powerlessness.

We could despair. Many people are self-isolating, keeping themselves to themselves.

We could despair. There are still people who have yet to grasp the seriousness of the situation.

But despair is not the approach with which we must and can defy corona.

Showing solidarity with one another is one approach we can take. Showing solidarity whilst keeping a safe distance. Showing solidarity by looking for, finding and using new ways of communicating and being together.

Sharing, through which we provide others with essential things, whether this be one of the last packets of flour on the supermarket shelf or protective masks which are not needed at present in the industry.

Sharing, by offering assistance across borders when it comes to caring for the sick.

Sharing, by saying THANK YOU to those people who, because of the jobs they do, are now exposed to particular burdens.

The public service is a sector which is under a particular amount of strain. Citizens want and are entitled, to rely on the public service.

This is not the time to grumble about what may have been falsely prioritised in the past. And it’s more than obvious that mistakes were made. We need to make use of the time to reflect on solutions which meet the challenges of today and tomorrow.

The challenges are of a material nature but are in particular challenges involving physical and psychological stress. Thank you to the doctors, nurses and carers who work in our health service.

Thank you to those people monitoring internal security, thank you to the police and public order officials, and thank you also to those who are actually meant to provide external security but are now helping out in those places where domestic provision is reaching its limits, thanks to the soldiers, thanks to armed services personnel and thanks to the reservists.

Thanks also to the pedagogues and educators, who have taken on the task of urgent childcare, thanks to the teachers, who are making sure that a minimum amount of training can take place online.

Thanks to all public service employees.

Thanks to the shop assistants and people working in logistics, who are making sure that comestibles and other staples continue to be supplied.

But thanks also to the politicians who are taking care with their generous decisions to absorb or at least mitigate the economic damage felt by those who suddenly find themselves without work and those who are offering jobs, because there will be a time after corona, for which we need to prepare today, even if we don’t know when this day will dawn.

We must not allow ourselves to be taken hostage by feelings of despair. We need to think of tomorrow.

I wish for all of us who manage to emerge physically and mentally unscathed from the social distancing phase to keep our sense of optimism for tomorrow.

And when, one day, Corona has been vanquished, we shouldn’t be too quick to forget the lessons we’ve learned. Instead, we should devote more attention to foresight. Corona reveals to us that, despite highly developed technology, we can come up against boundaries, boundaries which can only be overcome if we are prepared to shape things together in a way which takes account of others.

It will fall to the independent trade unions and lobbies in their capacity as key public service organisations in Germany and Europe to make sure that our society, in which we have a stake, does not just go back to business as usual as soon as the crisis is behind us. We will admonish anyone who deviates too quickly from the path and we will rise to the challenge of ensuring that, next time, we are better prepared.

Thomas Sohst

Regional Chairman for the West in the German Bundeswehr Alliance

President of the CESI Trade Council ‘Defence’ (DEF)

For further reading:

COVID-19: The Pandemic and Its Impact on Security Policy

In a split of a second, everything we knew, everything we were used to, everything which seemed normal, has become different. What has so far represented warmth and safety -human proximity and closeness- is now a source of danger.

Shaking hands, the millennium-old ritual of showing each other’s peaceful intention: a relic of the past. Social gatherings, ever since central for mankind’s survival and human evolution: a punishable act. The picture of a jogger being pursued by a policeman -for jogging!- speaks for itself.

And we accept it. We accept the strongest repressions of our civil liberties since the end of WWII. We accept being controlled and fined for sitting on a bench, for going for a walk, for being too close to someone else.

In just a few weeks…

Predictions of political analysts and sociologists “that this crisis will result in a growing tendency amongst our citizens to prefer effective authoritarianism above slow and ineffective democracy” indeed cast a shadow on the future of our freedoms.

But I still believe that we accept it for good reasons. For the reason that human lives, regardless of their age, count. For the reason that human lives must prevail over profit. For the reason that human lives are to be saved – (so far) at any costs.

Whatever it takes.

How far are we willing to go? How big are the collateral economic and social damages we are willing to bear? Our policy responses to Corona lead us straight to core ethical questions. And proposals for new approaches to confinement policies (which would target the risk groups, above all the elder population, not the entire society) reveal first societal cracks which may divide us.

Our societies are being put to the test.

***

So are our members and their affiliates, countless of them currently fighting at the frontline. And the weight mainly lies on the shoulders of the public sector, most visibly on public health care services.

But we notice how much more is essential: pharmacies, supermarkets, transport companies and courier services, cleaning companies… These are services almost unnoticed in normal times, yet indispensable for our societies to function; as many of us only realise now.

Confronted with ever-increasing death tolls, saving lives becomes a frenzy obsession. In a collective defiance, society braces itself against the virus.

Whatever it takes.

***

And the European Union is put to the test.

The image of an EU coming too late and doing too little – if not being cold-hearted in the face of unseen needs for help- will hardly be erased from too many memories, and has led to incommensurable damage.

“The European Union may have survived Brexit, the refugee crisis and the financial meltdown of 2008 — but don’t assume COVID-19 can’t destroy it”, an American scholar recently wrote in Politico.

Yet, despite the EU facing one of its most existential crisis, it might be more needed than ever.

The CESI Presidium established on March 26 that to fight pandemics “in the future, the allocation of competences, finances and capabilities will have to ensure more solidarity among the Member States and crisis management that do not stop at borders. A stronger role, more financial resources and enhanced capacities for the EU will be necessary” In other words, more competence for the EU is needed.

And the EU has to do whatever it takes to mitigate the tremendous economic impacts, not least because no national economy can shield itself on its own; even more so given that “the countries hit the worst by the pandemic — Italy, Spain and France — are the ones that have the least amount of fiscal breathing space”.

Fabian Zuleeg and Janis Emmanouilidis from the European Policy Centre wrote: “Decisive action from political leaders can still reduce the negative impact – but only if there is a coordinated and concerted response, encompassing countries across Europe. Fortunately, we have an instrument to deal with cross-border challenges – the European Union”. According to them, the EU will “potentially be even more important in the aftermath of the COVID-19 crisis” and “a coordinated and robust action plan based on effective interaction between economic, financial, monetary and fiscal policies … has the best chance of succeeding.”

It is, therefore, the EU which has to pool resources, which has, as some called it, to deploy a ‘battery of measures’, including “‘whatever it takes’ fiscal responses”. This would comprise Eurobonds (recently recoined Coronabonds) and send an important message both to citizens and the world: the EU is there to help. It guarantees unity, strength and stability.)

Whatever it takes.

***

It is our future which is put to the test.

A major German investor told me recently that compared to previous crises the difference of the COVID-19 crisis lies in the fact that each and everyone of us is deeply affected. And that we can assume that the world, our societies, the economy will be different; a divide between pre-Corona and post-Corona- maybe for worse, maybe for better.

I hope that our societies will have shielded as many as they could and that my 88 years old father will be as feisty as always. I hope that my children will not be faced with economic devastation, but that they will look into a bright future, where both wealth and freedoms are granted. And I hope I will then take my father and my children and travel to Italy or Spain – to places with great food and warm people, where life is exuberant and generous.

‘Never Waste a Good Crisis’ was the conclusion of the so-called 2009 Wolstenholme Report, calling on the British construction industry to use the ‘Great Recession’ as an ‘opportunity’ to change – for the better.

Mourning thousands of victims can hardly be called an ’opportunity’. It is a devastatingly painful lesson. But it marks an opportunity to rethink our lives, our societies and our work. It will impact on our future decisions on how to organise our health services, how to green our economies, how to improve coordination and solidarity in the (by then hopefully still existing) European Union, how to increase the respect and the tribute we must pay to public services and the general interest – for the better.

And not least how to further improve and adapt our work at CESI.

As I wrote to you two weeks ago: CESI is not only a confederation. We are designed to help. It is our raison d’être, and we can only hope that belonging to ‘our family’ may make the situation a little bit more bearable.

Take care of yourselves – and of each other.

Whatever it takes.

Throughout last week, the European Commission announced several key measures to address the ongoing crisis and to help weather the storm caused by the outbreak.

From an economic perspective, the Commission reacted by proposing to activate the escape clause of the Stability and Growth Pact (so that Member States can indebt themselves to fight COVID-19 without having to respect the EU’s budget deficit rules), announcing previously unseen flexibility on state aid rules (so that Member States can subsidise economic sectors and actors without violating the competition rules of the EU’s internal market), as well as putting forward a proposal for a Corona Response Investment Initiative to instantly make available close to €38 Billion to support member states’ economies and healthcare systems in their fight against the pandemic.

From a health perspective, the European Commission published European manufacturing standards for medical supplies. The European Commission also announced a joint procurement plan for personal protective equipment. Moreover, it adopted decisions on harmonised standards which will allow manufacturers to place on the market high performing devices.

The European Parliament approved the European Commission’s proposal on more flexible airport slots for airlines, in order to help them not lose slots as they do under ordinary rules if the do not operate them sufficiently as is currently the case. Now, the Council has to formally approve the European Parliament’s position; the adopted measures will enter into force once published in the Official Journal of the European Union in the coming days.

In the area of food supply, on March 25^th, the Croatian Council Presidency published a press release following the videoconference of EU Ministers in charge of agriculture and fisheries. Ministers discussed measures already taken, as well as those planned at the national and European level in order to counteract the negative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the agriculture and fisheries sectors.

On transport, the European Commission published a communication on the implementation of the Green Lanes for a seamless cross-border transport of essential goods in the EU under the Guidelines for border management measures. These “green lane” border crossings should be open to all freight vehicles carrying any type of goods. Crossing the border should not take more than 15 minutes.

The European Commission followed up on this on March 26^th by publishing an additional communication calling on EU Member States to support air cargo operations during the coronavirus crisis. It recommends operational and organisational steps to keep essential transport flows moving. Further recommendations include granting temporary traffic rights for additional cargo operations from outside the EU.

On 23^rd March, European Commissioner for Justice and Consumers Didier Reynders sent written letters to Facebook, Google, Amazon, Alibaba Group, eBay, Rakuten, Cdiscount, WishShopping and Allegro requiring their cooperation in taking down Corona-related scams from their platforms.

On that day, European Commissioner for Internal Market Thierry Breton held a videoconference with CEOs of European telecommunication companies to discuss: network resilience, the need to collect anonymised mobile metadata to help analyse the patterns of diffusion of the coronavirus in full compliance with the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and ePrivacy legislation, and the importance of protecting the networks against cyber-attacks.

On March 25^th the European Commission launched the AI-ROBOTICS vs COVID-19 initiative to collect ideas about deployable artificial intelligence and robotic solutions as well as information on other initiatives that could help face the ongoing COVID-19 crisis.

On March 24^th, the Eurogroup convened via video conference in order to take stock of the measures already taken and of the initiatives that are being explored among institutions in response to the COVID-19 economic fallout.

On March 25^th, the European Commission issued guidelines to ensure a strong EU-wide approach to foreign investment screening in a time of public health crisis and related economic vulnerability. The aim is to preserve EU companies and critical assets, notably in areas such as health, medical research, biotechnology and infrastructures that are essential for our security and public order, without undermining the EU’s general openness to foreign investment.

(This content was created with the help of content provided by Dods Parliamentary Communications Ltd.)