Workers’ voice advocates: Franco-German overlap is “window of opportunity”

With France holding the EU Council presidency until July and a Social Democrat-led government in power in Germany, hopes are high in Brussels for progress on key labour-related files like the revision of the European Works Council (EWC) Directive.

For proponents of workers’ right to co-determination within companies, the recent years have seen relatively little movement. Key pieces of EU legislation, like the European Works Council Directive, have scarcely been touched.

“We have been waiting a relatively long time for legal initiatives in the field of collective rights,” explained Maxi Leuchters, head of division at workers’ voice non-profit Hans-Böckler Foundation.

While the influence of works councils in Germany and France is famous, oftentimes spelling trouble for chief executives, the directive that was meant to export the concept across the EU, the EWC directive, has seen little attention outside the European Parliament, bar a 2018 handbook published by the European Commission.

But the confluence of the new government in Berlin and the French EU Council presidency has made workers’ voice proponents more upbeat.

“We have high hopes for the French Council Presidency to strengthen the European works councils,” Leuchters told EURACTIV.

The EWC directive had initially been a French initiative, following protests at Peugeot factories in the 1990s, socialist EU lawmaker Gabriele Bischoff told EURACTIV.

With Social Democrats in power in Berlin, the balance has shifted and socialist governments now represent a significant share of the leaders in the EU-27 Council.

“With the new German government, this may then also lead to new majorities in the Council,” Leuchters added. “In December, we had the first European Council meeting where the conservative parties in Europe did not have a majority.”

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The influence that workers’ voice advocates and trade unions are able to bring to bear in the new German government was best illustrated by a minor mishap. The coalition agreement that was sent to journalists on 24 November 2021 indicated that the last person to edit it was Reiner Hoffman, the head of German trade union umbrella organisation DGB. 

Given that French President Emmanuel Macron had singled out labour issues in his famous 2017 Sorbonne speech, Leuchters said that the overlap of the French presidency and the new German government presented a “window of opportunity.” 

EWC directive sees renewed activity

The EWC, which some have taken to calling an “unloved stepchild,” may just be the largest benefactor from the newly increased influence of trade unions and workers’ voice advocates.

The EWC, which was last revised in 2009, is now facing a new push from the European Parliament to get the European Commission to propose its revision, something the Commission has thus far been reluctant to do.  

“We have already had various discussions on this topic with the European Commission, which has repeatedly proposed non-legislative approaches,” said Leuchters.

One of the key sticking points that workers’ advocates want to tackle is the lack of sanctions available should company leadership fail to consult workers’ representatives in due time, a common issue. 

“In the end, people are only informed and consulted when the measure has already been implemented. And in the end, that is not in the spirit of the directive,” Leuchters explained, noting that the available avenues for sanctions were too ineffective.

Her understanding appears to be shared by German conservative EU lawmaker Dennis Radtke, who has the lead on an ongoing report on a review proposal for the EWC directive by the European parliament.

“We don’t want to reinvent the wheel. It is now more about quality than quantity. A strengthened sanction mechanism is certainly an important lever in this regard,” Radtke told EURACTIV.

His office hopes to have the report voted on in the Parliament’s labour committee in May or June, before putting it to a full parliamentary vote in June or July, which would then kick the ball into the European Commission’s court.

[Edited by Zoran Radosavljevic]

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