Round Table

QUESTIONS FOR THE ROUND TABLE 

  • On the basis of your experience in your company, how would you judge the impact of European legislation on the activity of your EWC and/or more in general on industrial relations in your transnational group? (Please refer in particular to the Directives on employee involvement, but without excluding other Directives which you consider relevant in this regard) Emanuele Recchia and Patrizia Ordasso
  • On the basis of your experience of European Social Dialogue in the Banking Sector, how would you judge the impact of European legislation on European Social Dialogue in the Banking Sector so far? (Please refer in particular to the Directives on employee involvement, but without excluding other Directives which you consider relevant in this regard)  Has it been a valuable support tool? How would you judge the role of the European Commission in European Social Dialogue in the Banking Sector?  Angelo Di Cristo and Jens Thau
  • On the basis of your experience in the previous legislature and now, how would you judge the Fitness Check on the Directives on employee involvement proposed/promoted by the European Commission?   Brando Benifei
  • What are your impressions on Professor Dorssemont’s proposals on these European Directives?  Angelo Di Cristo, Jens Thau, Emanuele Recchia, Alfio Filosomi
  • Do you think it is possible for your Federations to find common ground and to work together on Professor Dorssemont’s proposals on these European Directives?   Angelo Di Cristo, Jens Thau
  • Anticipating change: from information/consultation during decision-making to participation. In your opinion, how can we manage this process and with which tools – both within your EWC and, more in general, in industrial relations in your transnational groups (starting for instance from business plans and without prejudice to confidentiality clauses)? Emanuele Recchia, Patrizia Ordasso
  • Which consequences can the time/era of shrinking financial intermediation margins (active and passive rates),  of increasing capital requirements (Basel, etc.), of the drive towards digitization have on the transnational structure of your groups, in terms of geographical extent and growth and/or reorganization prospects? Emanuele Recchia, Patrizia Ordasso
  • After this round table, what can you do within the Committee on Employment and within the European Parliament to make European legislation more effective in promoting employee involvement? Considering the current majority and, more in general, the distribution of seats in the Parliament elected on 26 May, as well as the Agenda of the new European Commission, which alliances can you envisage on the issue of employee involvement? Brando Benifei

REPORT

Before opening our discussion and dialogue with the employers’ reps attending the seminar, we had distributed to them and all participants the 13-point document that Prof. Dorssemont had presented to the Plenary.

Such a background was meant to manage the final round table that we called:

“How to support day-to-day operations and improve the effectiveness of EU legislation on employee involvement in the 4.0 finance industry and the changing work environment; the anticipation of change: from information/ consultation at the decision making stage to participation”.

This round table was attended by:

  • Mr Jens Thau, chairman of the European Banking Federation’s Banking Committee for European Social Affairs,
  • Mr Emanuele Recchia, Head of Labour policies, Industrial relations and Welfare at Unicredit Group,
  • Mrs Patrizia Ordasso, Responsible for Trade Union affairs and Labour policies at Intesa Sanpaolo, and on behalf of the trade unions,
  • by Mr Angelo Di Cristo, Head of Uni Finance and
  • Mr Giuliano Calcagni, at that time FISAC-CGIL General Secretary.
  • The European Parliament was represented by Mr Brando Benifei, MEP, from the Employment and Social Affairs Committee.

Our realistic expectations from this first discussion and exchange of points of view, namely with the employers’ reps, were fulfilled, since their feedback to our proposals showed their willingness to develop and to deepen the dialogue even if of course they did not agree about certain specific points and requested a convenient amount of time to reflect upon the proposals.

MEP Brando Benifei about Dorssemont’s 13 points

Question by Mario Ongaro:

It was also thanks to the initiative we took with Brando Benifei at the end of our previous European Project VS/2015/0359, which led the Employment Committee of the European Parliament to submit a question on a possible reform of the EWC Directive, that the Commission decided to carry out a fitness check, i.e. to assess the state of implementation of Directives on employee involvement.

That was a very significant result. However, we are bit worried about the approach that seems to prevail in this fitness check (as our expert, Filip Dorssemont, warned us). The Commission seems to think that, if these Directives are not being effective, it is because they are too prescriptive, so they need to be simplified, dismantled, deregulated.

I would like to ask Brando Benifei what he thinks about it.

Brando Benifei

In the case of the EWC reform, which is what we are discussing here in connection with the fitness check, already in 2016 we expected a report from the European Commission. However, this did not happen.

During one of the meetings in which I took part, I asked the European Commission when they would perform their task. Then, also thanks to the involvement of some colleagues, the Commission decided to launch the fitness check – albeit late. 

However, we are not very happy. Many of us believe that the European Commission did not consider the main critical aspects of current EWC legislation. It also failed to define a clear position on the need for a reform. Under these circumstances, a reform even risks being worse than what we already have, whereas we want to make the rules more effective.

In particular, I agree with several colleagues that there is a negative aspect in the report of the Commission, i.e. its failure to address the inconsistency between the objectives listed in the EWC Directive and their actual implementation (mostly with respect to the timeliness and completeness of information and consultation procedures). This is indeed a crucial point and any failure to address it would make the existence of EWCs useless.

I would also like to add that the approach of the European Parliament – at least of a majority of MEPs – is more in line with the approach summarized by Mario Ongaro.

The European Pillar on Social Rights, which was approved and solemnly presented in 2017 (in the final stages of the discussion which led at last to the fitness check), expressly mentions the need to promote dialogue between social partners and employee involvement in the recommendations contained in Chapter II par. 8: “workers or their representatives have the right to be informed and consulted in good time on matters relevant to them, in particular on the transfer, restructuring and merger of undertakings and on collective redundancies.”

In its accompanying report to the approval of the Pillar, the European Parliament stated very clearly that it is necessary to better monitor the actual implementation of relevant legislation in existing EWCs. Furthermore, it also highlighted the need for effective measures for an increased social responsibility in industrial reorganization processes. In my opinion, this is also one of the goals we set ourselves when we create these information and consultation mechanisms. The European Parliament also asked for a better coordination among the local, regional, national and European levels. This is necessary in order for EWCs to be able to express their opinions in good time at the various levels, in such a way for effective actions to be taken.

Then, it is also necessary to discuss the abuse of confidentiality clauses and to better define under which circumstances and for how long management can withdraw sensitive information.

All these issues require us to work with the new European Commission to discuss a possible revision and reform of Directive 2009/38. 

I believe that it is now time to reopen the discussion we had with the outgoing Commissioner with the new one.