EUROPEAN REVIEW

ISSUE 35 - Page 5

With hardly a day going by without negative stories about the European Union appearing in the British press, the UK population could be forgiven for asking if anything positive has come from Brussels. As a new TUC pamphlet helps to redress the balance, we set out the improvements that have been made to working lives by EU legislation.

THERE ARE FEW AREAS of working life in the United Kingdom that have not been improved by legislation originating from the EU. That is the conclusion to be drawn from the list of benefits for people in all walks of life that are listed in the new TUC pamphlet ‘Europe and your rights at work’. Twelve concrete examples are taken from ‘a much longer list’ of rights according to the introduction. They include equal pay, sex discrimination, paternity and maternity, paid holidays, working time, information and consultation, and health and safety.
Each right is exemplified by an individual who has benefited from an EU measure. Shirley Holmes, a GMB convenor at Sheffield City Council had her hours of work reduced and won the chance to earn a bonus after UK law based on the EU ‘Equal Pay Directive’ was used to compare her condition to equivalent male workers. Anne Meacock, a bar worker from Swansea benefits from the ‘Working Time Directive’ which guarantees her four weeks paid holiday a year. Since the UK government implemented this in 1998, a judgement by the European Court of Justice has removed a loophole which had left out workers in their first 13 weeks of a job. Now they have agreed to add bank holidays to the entitlement which will give Anne and her colleagues another eight days leave.
Among the torrent of health and safety law that has come from Brussels, the Control of Asbestos at Work has appeared in several directives and Geoff Waterfield, the Community Safety representative at Corus Teesside, is reassured that the company bases its ‘very high standards of asbestos elimination’ on EU legislation.
The situation of Martin Chalk, an airline pilot, shows how union-employer negotiations at European level can supplement the law. The original ‘Working Time Directive’ left out some sectors including many transport workers but the social partners in the aviation industry came to an agreement that limited flying hours to 900 a year, ensured 7 days a month free of all duty and stipulated a regular free health assessment. This deal, in turn. became a new directive. According to Mr. Chalk ‘the EU institutions show that they can often establish these rules more effectively than national governments’.
Turning to the future, the booklet opines that increasing globalisation will lead to an even greater need for socially conscious labour legislation. This must go hand in hand with the extension of the single market and a competitive European economy. ‘Only when these two processes have fallen out of step have we encountered serious difficulties. The vigorous debate over the Services Directive is a case in point’ say the authors.
 They predict an increasing focus on corporate social responsibility building on the success of European Works Councils and observe that ‘company law in most European countries…is moving in the direction of directors’ duties being much wider than simply maximising the short-term profitability of shareholders’. Work/life balance is another concern whose importance will increase and the present UK opt-out on working hours is not sustainable, according to the booklet. The Scandinavian countries are cited as examples of combining family-friendly policies with competitiveness.
The pamphlet ends with a consideration of the consequences of pushing the free market US business model without social measures. It comes to the conclusion that ‘this mismatch directly fuels rejection of the opening-up of the economy - in other words it leads to protectionism’. ‘That kind of Europe will not get - and does not deserve to get - worker and trade union support’.

‘Europe and your rights at work’ is available on the TUC internet site at:

http://www.tuc.org.uk/international/tuc-11995-f0.cfm