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A PSIRU Report for EPSU, by Robin de la Motte, David Hall, and Emanuele Lobina, PSIRU, University of Greenwich, UK - 23.10.2003
1. Introduction
The European Works Councils (EWC) Directive, initially adopted in 1994 , aims to improve the right of workers to information and consultation in transnational companies. It requires transnational companies to establish information and consultation agreements covering their entire European workforce, if they have not already done so. The content of these agreements is largely left to negotiation between management and employee representatives, but minimum requirements where management refuses to negotiate include the requirement of annual reports to the EWC on the company’s business prospects, and the right to be informed about exceptional circumstances affecting employees’ interests, such as closure or collective redundancy.
The EWC directive applies to companies, or groups of companies , with
- at least 1000 employees across the member states , and
- at least 150 employees in each of two or more distinct member states.
These employment criteria represent a lower bound - companies meeting them are obliged to establish an EWC, but companies which do not meet them may nonetheless choose to establish one voluntarily. In a number of instances companies have chosen to do so, whether it be for purposes of labour relations, prestige (to demonstrate Europe-wide coverage), or (in the case of UK during its optout) in the expectation of the future introduction of a legal obligation.
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