EU: the EU’s ministers council did not reach agreement on the directive proposal on supplementary pensions

During the ministers' council on May 30, Ministers of Social Affairs from the twenty-seven countries could not reach a compromise on the directive proposal concerning the portability of rights to supplementary pension. This project, which protects the rights to a pension of mobile workers, suffers from the complexity of the topic and the diversity of national systems. The Dutch government, which is the only one to block the adoption of this bill -which requires a unanimous vote - is determined to oppose to a text which "totally lacks ambition". (Ref. 070477)
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A sweetened text. The Dutch government takes full responsibility for this failure. The German Labour Minister, also president of the EU Ministers’ council, Franz Müntefering, failed to rally his Dutch counterpart, Piet Hein Donner, to his bill, which requires member states to be unanimous. Supported by his Parliament, the Dutch social affairs minister declared that he could not accept that this text would lead to a “financial collapse for Dutch companies”. Since he has been fighting for a more

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