IR Notes

The European Court of Human Rights has issued a ruling with major practical implications concerning the right of employers to monitor conversations conducted via electronic messaging by their employees. The case concerns a Romanian engineer who used a Yahoo Messenger account, set up at his work station at the request of his company in order to facilitate dealings with a client. He was charged with using this messaging service for personal purposes as well, to conduct communications of a private nature with people close to him (see the press release for more details. The employee, whose correspondence was monitored and transcribed by his employer, argued that the latter had violated article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights concerning the right to respect for private and family life, the home and correspondence. The Court did not find it unreasonable that an employer should want to verify that its employees were completing their professional tasks during working hours and noted that the employer had accessed the employee’s account in the belief that it contained client-related communications. However, one judge expressed a dissenting opinion contesting the Court’s decision and noting that a proper company policy concerning the scope for monitoring conversations and the use of IT resources provided by the employer did not exist. In our opinion, the position adopted by the Court should not release employers from clearly defining the rights and obligations of employees in relation to the use for personal purposes of the company’s communication resources (ECHR, 12 January 2016, application No. 61496/08, Bărbulescu v. Romania).

• European pillar of social rights: The President of the European Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, has appointed Allan Larsson as a special adviser for the previously announced “European Pillar of Social Rights” (see press release). According to Jean-Claude Juncker, this pillar “should complement what we have already jointly achieved when it comes to the protection of workers in the EU. And I believe we do well to start with this initiative within the euro area.” It is expected to be “a self-standing reference document, of a legal nature” that should define the “key principles and values shared at EU level” and “serve as a framework to screen employment and social performance” in the relevant member states.


• European unemployment insurance: The Employment and Social Affairs committee of the European Parliament on 26 January heard the views of the Italian Minister of Economy and Finance, Pier Carlo Padoan, who had suggested the creation of a European unemployment insurance scheme in an article last October. The Parliament had published a report (in English) in 2014 highlighting the merits of establishing a social protection system of this kind at European level.


• Social dumping: The MEP Guillaume Balas (S&D) on 25 January presented a report on social dumping to the Committee on Employment and Social Affairs of the European Parliament. The report notably calls for the “creation of a European body of cross-border labour inspectors” and emphasises that “airline pilots and train drivers cannot be considered to be independent of the companies for which they work”. The text calls on the member states to “eliminate precarious contracts called ‘zero hour contracts’ or ‘pay to fly contracts'”.


• Principle of equal work, equal pay in relation to posted workers: In an interview with the French daily newspaper Les Echos (in French), the German and French ministers of labour, Andrea Nahles and Myriam El Khomri, defended the principle of “equal pay for equal work in the same place”, because “it is necessary to curb still further the distortions of competition between French employees and posted workers”.

• Retirement rights: the Court of Justice of the European Union has condemned Cyprus (CJEU, 21 January 2016, case C-515/14) for its legislation on retirement rights, which puts migrant workers at a disadvantage compared to those who do not leave Cyprus to work (see press release).

• Shop opening hours: with a view to rebooting the economy, the government has completely liberalised opening hours for shops and hairdressing salons by revoking the restrictive laws previously in place. As a result, employers have extended the opening hours of certain shops, in particular large supermarket chains, and modified working hours. The main trade union in the sector was opposed to this measure, fearing a rise in short-term jobs, as well as security, childcare and transport problems for employees working in the evenings and at night.

Jobs plan: The President of France on 18 January presented a plan to boost employment in the face of “an economic and social state of emergency”. Under the plan, which is backed by a budget of 2 billion euros, companies with fewer than 250 workers will receive an annual €2,000 pay-out for two years for every full-time worker they hire on contracts lasting more than six months and paid at a rate between the minimum wage and 1.3 times the minimum wage (between €1,466.62 and €1,906.60). In other respects, in the event of legal disputes, the compensation for dismissals without just or sufficient cause will be capped according to the employee’s seniority, except in the case of a serious breach of labour law, such as harassment or discrimination. This measure answers a repeated demand from employers. Finally, the state will make available 1 billion euros to double the number of training places for the unemployed, which will rise from 500,000 in 2015 to one million in 2016.

• Tougher posted worker controls: A decree of 19 January increases the obligations on project owners and contractors availing themselves of the services of providers domiciled outside France if the latter do not comply with the rules on compulsory declaration prior to posting. It increases the responsibility of project owners and contractors for payment of the posted workers.

• Trade union scandal: The chairman of the Swedish municipal workers’ union (Kommunal), Annelie Nordström, and the trade union’s treasurer, Anders Bergström, have announced their resignation as a result of their mismanagement of trade union assets, as revealed by Sweden’s biggest newspaper, Aftonbladet. Following the revelations, including that the loss-making activities of the trade union – 80% of whose members are women – included running a night-club offering sex shows, more than 9,600 members have left the union, weakening its position on the eve of important wage negotiations at national level.

Inovyn: The chemical groups Solvay and Ineos in 2015 established a joint venture under the name Inovyn, bringing together their chlorovinyls activities. The joint venture has its headquarters in London and generates revenues of more than three billion euros, with 18 sites across seven countries (Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Norway, Sweden, United Kingdom). Inovyn has 4,300 employees. From the onset of the process to set up the company, the European works councils of the two groups had already negotiated the creation of an interim body for information and consultation at European level. The body, consisting of 4 members of each of the two EWCs, was scheduled to remain in place until the negotiation of an agreement to establish a European works council for Inovyn had been concluded. This negotiation is now complete, and the text, which has been signed by all the members of the special negotiating body, awaits signature by management. The definition of transnational questions includes matters which, regardless of the number of member states involved, are of importance for the European workforce because of the size of their potential impact or because they concern the transfer of an undertaking between member states. The EWC will appoint a select committee comprising four members that will meet once every quarter. The select committee will act as a filter alongside management in order to examine which information and consultation procedure should be instigated, depending on the plans put forward by management. In the case of consultation, the select committee and management will first discuss the consultation timetable that will apply, while limiting the consultation period to twenty-eight days following receipt of all the necessary information from management. However, the two parties may decide to shorten this period.

• Generali: The European works council of the Italian insurance group Generali is currently working on drawing up principles with a view to incorporating the use of teleworking.

Alfmeier: The German company Alfmeier Präzision (2,200 employees), which specialises in the manufacture of precision components for the automobile and medical industries, on 15 December 2015 signed an agreement on worker involvement in connection with its change of status to become a European Company (SE). The agreement does not provide for employees to participate in the company’s management body as this form of involvement did not exist prior to the conversion to an SE. However, it sets up an SE works council with 11 members (7 from Germany, which represents 69% of the workforce, and 4 from the Czech Republic (31% of employees). The agreement in particular provides for the works council to meet three times a year and for proposed measures to be implemented only after completion of the SE works council’s consultation procedure. The select committee of the SE works council will also be consulted by management about future employment and investment plans.

• Saint-Gobain: The steering committee of the Saint-Gobain global trade union network (180,000 employees) met for the first time on 12 January at the initiative of IndustriALL Global Union and the French trade union FCE-CFDT. Its aim is “to follow the evolution of the group and also to ensure global coordination at trade union level” (see FCE-CFDT press release, in French). Two further meetings are scheduled for 2016.


• Michelin: The European trade union federation IndustriALL on 12 January organised a meeting with representatives of its affiliates within the French Michelin group. At the beginning of November, the group announced a restructuring plan affecting three countries (Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom), with the planned loss of 1,600 jobs. The trade unionists made known their demands in terms of measures to deal with the social impact. At the same time, they called on the European Commission to act in the face of “aggressive – if not unfair – competition” from Chinese products (see press release).

• Engie: The negotiation of a European framework agreement laying down the principles to be respected in the event of restructuring has been completed. The text will be sent to the national trade unions affiliated to the European federations IndustriAll, EPSU and EFBWW for approval. The text could be officially signed in March.

• Labour market reforms in Italy and Spain: The European Trade Union Institute has published a working paper offering an evaluation of the labour market reform adopted in 2012 (“Fornero reform”), prior to that undertaken by the current government under Matteo Renzi (“Job Act”). The author indicates that the key measure aimed at reducing the protection against dismissal had no significant impact either on how the labour market operated or on the level of employment, which continued to fall, or on the jobless total, which went up. Similar scepticism is contained in a working paper analysing the impact of labour market reforms in Spain. These publications seek to highlight the failure of measures to undermine certain social rights – regarded as slowing down recruitment – in terms of tackling unemployment.


• Increase in unemployment and in precarious work: The International Labour Organisation has published its annual report World Employment and Social Outlook – Trends 2016 (in English) together with a summary. The document expects global unemployment to rise by nearly 2.3 million in 2016 and by a further 1.1 million in 2017. The report also highlights the persistence of vulnerable employment, which still accounts for more than 46% of total employment on a global scale, affecting close to 1.5 billion people.


• Digitisation and job losses: The World Economic Forum, which organises the annual Davos meeting of political and business leaders, has published a study – The future of jobs – which puts at 5.1 million the number of jobs that will be lost in the next 5 years as a result of digitisation of the economy (7.1 million jobs lost and 2 million jobs created). The study analyses the impact of digitisation on the different job families and for skills management.