European Union News - Social Affairs

Ministers meeting in Brussels on 7 March 2011 for the celebration of the Employment, Social Policy, Health and Consumer Affairs Council, issued their conclusions on the European Platform against Poverty and Social Exclusion: A European framework for social and territorial cohesion. In their conclusions, ministers stressed the fact that preventing and alleviating poverty and social exclusion will require a coordinated action of all relevant efforts and instruments at EU and national levels.

The public hearing of the Single Market Observatory (SMO) of the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC) in Budapest provided Hungarian civil society organisations a unique opportunity to express their views on how to best relaunch the European Single Market and to debate the Single Market Act with their counterparts at European level.

The European Union has fixed 5 March 2011 as the date to celebrate the first European Equal Pay Day. This initiative aims to bring attention to the rest of the days that women must work to match the amount of money earned by men, given that according to recent figures women in the European Union earn on average 17.5% less than men during their lifetimes.

Dialogue between workers' and employers' representatives and between governments has been crucial in helping to shape Europe's response to the crisis. The involvement of social partners, workers and employers, in negotiation and consultation has helped companies and workers to adapt to change and their contribution has, in particular, helped to minimise job losses in Europe according to a new report published by the European Commission.

At a specially convened summit held in Brussels on 1 March with, European Commission Vice-President Viviane Reding met CEOs and chairs of boards of publicly listed companies from 10 European countries. Participant in this event took the opportunity to discuss how to get more women into top jobs and whether self-regulation by companies themselves or regulation should be the way to make significant changes quickly. Further to this meeting Commission's Justice department also held a "mini-hearing" with social partners on the same issue.

The European Commission has published an evaluation of the agreement to ensure a minimum level of protection against stress at work, concluding that it has had positive effects where implemented. In particular, employers' and workers' efforts have led to policy developments in 12 Member States where little had been done before. Although the agreement has not been implemented evenly in all countries, 19 Member States now have legislation or binding collective agreements that address stress or other psychological risks at work.