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EUROPEAN REVIEW
ISSUE 25 - Page
3
EU to press on with rail liberalisation as unions, employers
agree standards
THE drive to open up European railways to competition seems set to
continue after the European Parliament voted for a proposal which was
more radical than that arrived at by the Council of Ministers. While
the Council wanted to open up international freight services from
2006 they fought shy of a date regarding passenger transport but, in
October, the debate on the subject in the Parliament ended with a
vote in favour of including passenger trains by 2008. Now a
'conciliation' process will come into operation to try to reconcile
the two views so that the Commission can draft a directive. The aim
of the parliament is that 'national borders should no longer be an
obstacle to free movement by rail. In future, trains will be able to
travel from Rotterdam to Rome, from Berlin to Bordeaux or from
Cardiff to Colmar without having to change national staff or
engines'. MEPs were insistent that the precondition for this opening
of the rail market is a strict EU-wide safety regime including
'harmonised conditions for issuing driving licences to train drivers
and professional qualifications for on-board rail staff performing
safety tasks'. To this end a European Railway Agency should be set up
in which both trade unions and employers will play a key
rôle.
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No Austrian trains ran during November's
strike
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March saw demonstrations across Europe: this
is Berlin
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Anticipating future developments the social partners met at
European level to thrash out agreements to operate in the new rail
environment. The two crucial issues were licences for European
locomotive drivers and working conditions for mobile workers employed
in cross-border railway services. Norbert Hansen, President of the
European Transport Federation railway section and chief trade union
negotiator saw the agreements as 'an indispensable condition for a
social, fair and safe European railway environment'. The fact that
this was the first time that the rail industry had held talks under
the EU's social dialogue process was noted by Johannes Ludewig for
the employers: 'These first ever negotiations between the railway
partners on a European level have contributed to shaping a common
European market for rail transport'. The process should eventually
lead to a European Directive.
At the moment four Member States: Sweden, the United Kingdom,
Austria, and Germany have already liberalised their freight rail
market while another six have passed laws ready for the EU decision.
This has not happened without controversy however as privatisation
and the splitting up of state-run operators have often been a prelude
to legislation. As well as the position in the U.K., where the
long-privatised system seems to be under pressure for reform in the
other direction from both the unions and the public, in Austria a
nationwide strike occurred in November. The right-wing government
wants to split the state railway company, ÖBB, into four parts
and claims that this will save about €1 billion but the Union of
Railway Employees (GdE) sees this as a first step towards
privatisation. The situation is not helped by plans to cut the
48,000-strong workforce by 12,000 within seven years. None of the
ÖBB's 7,000 trains or 800 buses ran for two days during the
strike. An international rail workers' day of action in March
focussed on railway safety amid fears that liberalisation and
privatisation may lead to lower standards. 'Safety must come before
profit' was the simple but fundamental position of the International
Transport Federation which organised the event.
