Date of release : 02-06-2005

Policy area : Employment, Social Policy, Health and Consumer Affairs Employment, Social Policy, Health and Consumer Affairs

Event : Employment, Social Policy, Health and Consumer Affairs Council

During the Employment and Social Affairs Council of 2 June 2005 in Luxembourg chaired by François Biltgen, Minister for Labour and Employment, the European Union’s employment ministers adopted several measures to improve working conditions within the European Union.

The Council adopted the proposal for a directive to implement the agreement reached between the Community of European Railways (CER) and the European Transport Workers’ Federation (ETF) on working conditions for mobile workers who provide cross-border services. Minister Biltgen was satisfied with this text as a key social measure to accompany the liberalisation of the railway sector. According to Minister Biltgen, "European social dialogue is a major success for Europe. It is a very important symbol for many of our fellow citizens to show that the social model and social dialogue exist and will continue to do so."

The Employment and Social Affairs Council also reached a political agreement on the proposals for regulations to establish a European job security and health agency and to create a European foundation for improving living and working conditions. These regulations seek to ensure more effective governance of these bodies in light of the recent enlargement. According to Minister Biltgen, "it is important that these two agencies work smoothly for Europe’s employment policy and social policy, since they have the task of providing us not just with figures and statistics, but also with ideas."

The Council of the European Union arrived at a general orientation on the proposal to create a European Institute for equality between men and women. The main tasks of this institute will be to provide the European institutions and Member States with data and statistics to foster the integration of policies of equality between men and women, to promote the fight against gender discrimination, and to disseminate information on equality between men and women to the citizens and workers of the European Union.

The Council adopted the conclusions prepared by the Presidency which sought to confirm, in the context of the 10th anniversary of the Beijing platform  for action, the commitments the European Union made at the ministerial conference held in Luxembourg in early February 2005 and at the session of the Commission on the Status of Women in New York in late February 2005.

The employment ministers also had a broad exchange of views on the Green Paper on a community approach to managing economic migrations of nationals from third countries. They agreed to say that this is a subject that also pertains to the Council’s Employment component due to its close link with the issue of demographic ageing and evolutions in the labour markets.

A few months before the European Commission’s presentation in late 2005 of an Action Plan on the establishment of a community legislative framework for economic migration, the Council’s June 2 debate highlighted the different points of view of the Member States on the approach to be adopted for the economic management of migration flows.