Global agreement on health and safety at work by GDF Suez

The management of the French energy group GDF Suez (147,200 employees) and three international trade union federations - the IndustriAll energy and industry federation, the BWI federation for the construction industry and the PSI public services federation - on 13 May 2014 signed a global agreement on health and safety at work.

The same parties had on 16 November 2010 signed a global agreement on fundamental rights, social dialogue and sustainable development which provided for the negotiation of future global accords in particular on training, restructuring, sustainable development and health and safety, which thus becomes the subject of this first application of the global deal. The new accord retains the main content of the group agreement on fundamental principles regarding health and safety dated 23 February 2010. At the time, the group had unilaterally decided to extend this European agreement to its world operations. Now these commitments are incorporated in an international collective agreement. The obligations undertaken will be followed up by a joint "extended health and safety reference committee", made up of eight management and eight employee representatives respectively, appointed by the three trade union federations which signed the agreement and by the monitoring committee set up within the EWC for the European agreement. The new committee must represent the different geographical regions and include at least three women.