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Luxembourg: insurance social partners sign new collective agreement
Mobilization.  While the insurance sector is doing well in the Netherlands, employees and unions don’t understand why the Association of Insurance Firms (ACA) is calling for a 50 percent cut to...
Germany: court to rule on corporate managements’ right to unilaterally change the law applicable to their EWC in Visteon case
Closing request denied three times.  The case opposing the European subsidiary of the American car part maker Visteon (27,000 employees total, about 13,000 in Europe) started on June 22, 2011 when...
EU: draft Parliament resolution to get the Commission to adopt a framework for socially responsible restructurings
Get the European Commission to do something.  This is clearly a response from the MEPs of the Parliament’ Employment Committee to the European Commission backtracking on the issue of the...
29 May 2012
EU: more than one in three national Parliaments rejects the European Commission’s proposal on the right to strike
Procedure.  This procedure, included in the protocol on application of the principles of subsidiarity and proportionality,” an annex to the Lisbon Treaty, gives national assemblies a right of...
Germany: ‘flexible quotas’ to increase the number of women on boards are about to become reality
Support from conservative MPs.  After arm wrestling for months with her colleague, Ursula von der Leyen, German Employment Minister and staunch advocate of “fixed women’s quotas” for businesses’...
Denmark: government announces new Act in the fall on flexible quotas for women on boards
“Our system received a very warm welcome.  It was obvious for everyone that it was new on the international scene, as we found a solution that addresses the issue without forcing businesses to...
Great Britain: PCS and Unite services unions are getting closer while RMT and TSSA transport unions are having a hard time taking it to the next level
Industrially, there is logic to the two unions working together where they both have members employed by the same organisations. However, this degree of overlap is relatively small, given that the...
EU: Parliament adopts resolution on the improvement of legislation on equal pay between men and women
Observation.  The paper reminds that recent figures – probably lower than reality – show that women earn on average 16.4 percent less than men in the EU and that the gender pay gap varies between...
28 May 2012
Belgium: parental leave to go from 3 up to 4 months on June 1st
The decree still needs to be published in the Official Journal (Moniteur Belge).  The communiqué released by the services of the Minister of Employment, Monica De Coninck, the text extends...
Italy: Filctem-CGIL, Femca-Cisl, and Uilcem-Uil unions commit to present unitary platforms for the renewal of their sectoral collective agreements
Opening the season of the renewal of agreements in chemistry-pharmacy, rubber, plastic, energy and oil, and gas and water, affecting approximately 450,000 workers, the managements of the...
Great Britain: gangmaster licensing authority reformed for agriculture supplying workers
What is going to change.  The GLA is no longer going to be present in some sectors where the risk is low, and where the number of vulnerable workers and abuses is going down (apprenticeship...
Germany: chemistry collective negotiations lead to a 4.5 percent wage increase and a “demographic corridor”
This year, in the race for wage increases, the chemical industry hasn’t done better than the metal industry which, a few days ago, secured a 4.3 percent increase over 13 months (see our dispatch...
Portugal: commentary of the labour law reform
tments undertaken in the Memorandum of Understanding signed with the IMF, the ECB and the European Commission in return for EUR 78 billion to help the country face its sovereign debt, the...
Denmark: government kicks off tripartite negotiations on social reforms
Increase working time to add 20,000 jobs to the labor market in 2020, thus enriching the State by DKK 4 billion (€ 538,268,228) a year – that’s the government’s key objective for the tripartite...
Netherlands: dismissal legislation amended
Five political parties forming a majority signed the “Kundunz” agreement – the name given to the 2013 budget.  The Parliament adopted it on April 26 and Queen Beatrix will present it on September...
Temporary work: study by the Prisme French employers’ organization, “crossed perspective in France and Europe in 2012” on representation and opinions on temporary work in four European countries
Temporary work more skilled in France.  Aged 24 in average, French temporary workers mostly start temporary work after being unemployed (54 percent).  A major change, more students and graduates...
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What readers clicked on the most last month.
1
Germany: pensioners in work already common practice, study shows
As the German government steps up measures to encourage people to stay in work beyond the legal retirement age, a new study by the Institute of Economic and Social Research (WSI) – an independent...
2
Spain: government approves creation of ‘intern status’
The Spanish government has paved the way for the creation of a new status for "persons undergoing non-professional practical training in companies, institutions or public or private organisations...
3
France: social conference on labour and pensions to proceed without main employers’ group
The preparatory meeting ahead of the social conference on labour and pensions, which is set to decide on the pension system model and the funding thereof, was held on 4 November at France's labour...
4
Luxembourg: two pension reform bills submitted to parliament
After lengthy negotiations with the social partners, in mid-October the Luxembourg government submitted two bills to parliament aimed at reforming the pension system to ensure its long-term...
5
France: TotalEnergies steps up commitment on disability
On 9 October, French energy group TotalEnergies and all representative trade unions signed a new four-year agreement on disability inclusion. Taking effect on 1 January 2026, the deal aims to help...
6
Germany: bill adopted to step up fight against illegal employment
On Thursday 13 November, Germany's Bundestag passed a bill to modernise and digitalise the country’s system for tackling undeclared work and financial crime. In future, the relevant department at...