Originally published in June 2003

Employee input to management A new level of involvement by employees in the strategies and decision making of their employer is less than two years away for larger employers. March 2005 will see the first stage of the Directive on Informing and Consulting Employees take effect.

Information and consultation with employee representatives will be required on:

  • the recent and probable development of activities and economic situation of the employer ’s organisation
  • the situation, structure and probable development of employment and any anticipatory measures envisaged – particularly where there is a threat to employment
  • decisions likely to lead to substantial changes in work organisation or in contractual relations including collective redundancies and transfers

It can be seen that this goes beyond the information and consultation requirements already applicable to redundancies and transfers. It will involve employee representatives in other management issues too. On all relevant developments, employee representatives will have a right to:

  • sufficiently detailed information and adequate time in which to study it
  • discussion with the appropriate level of management, and responses from management with reasons for those responses.

Enforcement against employers who do not inform and consult will take the form of penalties. The TUC has suggested that injunctive relief should be provided so that non-compliant employers could be made to revert to the status quo ante. As yet, we do not know how many small businesses will be exempt when the transitional period is completed by March 2008 -it could be 20 or 50 staff. However, we do know that in March 2005 the directive will apply to employers with more than 150 employees, and in March 2007 to employers with 100 or more staff.

TEMPORARY AGENCY WORKERS

Another layer of non-discrimination rules will be added to employment law when the proposed Directive on Temporary Work is adopted by the EU and implemented in the member states. Employers will be required to treat temporary agency workers the same as permanent and fixed term workers. However, some provisions in the proposal are being fiercely resisted by four member states (including the UK)and progress is now delayed until October 2003.Its key provisions include:

  • The basic working and employment conditions applicable to temporary workers should be at least those which would apply to such workers if they were directly recruited to occupy the same job
  • Clauses which prohibit temporary workers, after their posting, from concluding an employment contract with the organisation to which they were posted will be null and void
  • Temporary workers will count as included in the threshold number of workers required for worker representation

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