Nico Cué. In Belgium, we negotiate collective agreements at cross-industry level. The starting point is a report by the Central Economic Council (Conseil Central de l’Economie, CCE), composed of representatives from the government, the National Bank of Belgium and the social partners (employers and unions), presented in November of the year prior to the negotiations, which has been evaluating, since 1996, the evolution of wages in the past two years compared with Holland, France and Germany. This report provides what we call the wage margin – the average of the evolution of wages in the three countries surrounding them. In Belgium, we have a system of automatic indexation of wages and, even though we take account of the wage margin system, it shouldn’t question the indexation of wages. Last November, the CCE said that wages could be increased by 5% in average, but employers decided that inflation for the next two years was going to be around 3.9%, and would therefore only give 0.3% in buying power increase. There was a wide debate, but we couldn’t reach an agreement. In Belgium, white-collar and blue-collar workers are separated, with major differences in their regimes, since for instance layoff notice for 5 years in the company is 3 months for a white-collar worker and 35 days for a blue-collar worker. We absolutely want to improve everyone’s conditions, try to make sure blue-collar workers’ status is in line with white-collar workers’. We deemed the proposals we received insufficient. After negotiations failed, mediation got nowhere because it remained stuck on employers’ proposals regarding the increase in buying power. Now, the government has to send its draft agreement to the Parliament. Currently, we’re discussing with the green party, the humanist democratic center and the socialist party to present a number of amendments within the framework of the legislative procedures. The point for us is mostly to guarantees the freedom to negotiate wage increases at sectoral level.
debate, but we couldn’t reach an agreement. In Belgium, white-collar and blue-collar workers are separated, with major differences in their regimes, since for instance layoff notice for 5 years in the company is 3 months for a white-collar worker and 35 days for a blue-collar worker. We absolutely want to improve everyone’s conditions, try to make sure blue-collar workers’ status is in line with white-collar workers’. We deemed the proposals we received insufficient. After negotiations fail
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