Publications

In June 1999, the Greek General Confederation of Labour (GSEE) and the
Confederation of Public Servants (ADEDY) officially adopted a position in
favour of applying a "Tobin tax" to short-term capital movements.

The Spanish government's 1999 National Action Plan (NAP) for employment, in
response to the EU Employment Guidelines, has been severely attacked by the
trade unions. The unions criticise the content of the NAP, approved in May
1999, and the funds assigned to it, and claim that it appeared late and
lacked social dialogue in its preparation.

General elections were held in Belgium on 13 June 1999, resulting in the
defeat of the incumbent Christian Democrat/Socialist coalition. Negotiations
then began at federal and community levels on creating a so-called "rainbow"
coalition government. For the first time in its post-war history, Belgium
will be ruled by a political majority of Liberals, Socialists and Greens,
with the Christian Democrats being left on the sidelines.

On 21 July 1999, the general council of the Trades Union Congress (TUC)
pledged its support for a campaign [1] organised by the Transport and General
Workers' Union (TGWU) to try to win reinstatement for 270 workers sacked in
November 1998 by the Lufthansa-owned airline catering company Skychefs.

[1] http://www.tgwu.org.uk/news/support_skychefs.htm

After eight months of difficult negotiations, on 8 June 1999, Fim-Cisl,
Fiom-Cgil and Uilm-Uil, the metalworkers' unions belonging to the three main
trade union confederations, and the employers' associations Federmeccanica
and Assistal accepted a mediation proposal put forward by the Minister of
Labour, aimed at concluding the renewal of the collective agreement for the
Italian metalworking industry. During June and July, the procedure for
approval of the agreement involved consultation of trade union members on the
Ministry of Labour's proposal, and a referendum of all workers on the text of
the agreement agreed by the parties in June. In both consultations, the
majority of votes were cast in favour of the agreement, which opened the way
for its definitive signing.

In July 1999, four weeks of strike action by 130 midwives ended when members
of the midwives' trade union (Den almindelige Danske Jordmoderforening, DADJ)
voted by a large majority to accept the collective agreement which DADJ had
negotiated with the Association of County Authorities (Amtsrådsforeningen)
and Copenhagen's joint hospital administration (Hovedstadens
Sygehusfællesskab, HS). More than 60% of the union's members voted in the
ballot and more than 71% of those voting were in favour of the proposed
agreement.

In late May 1999, the VOO parents' organisation proposed implementing a
four-day working week in Dutch primary education as the only plausible way to
reduce working time in the sector. The issue of how to cope with ongoing
working time cuts at a time of teacher shortages has caused concern in
parliament, while one parents' association has unsuccessfully challenged in
the courts a school's decision to introduce a four-day week every other week.

Following legislation adopted in May 1999, Portugal's legal regime on
collective redundancies has been adopted to bring it fully into line with the
1992 EU collective redundancies Directive. Furthermore, the law abolishes a
previous rule that a worker who has accepted redundancy compensation cannot
legally challenge the redundancy.

The new President of the European Commission, Romano Prodi- chosen by the EU
Member States and approved by the European Parliament- announced his new
19-member team of Commissioners on 9 July 1999, by common accord with the
Member States. The first meeting of the proposed new-look Commission took
place on 16 July. Few of the sitting Commissioners survived the shake-out
following the allegations of irregularities which had beset the outgoing
administration. On announcing his team, Mr Prodi said that: "when I accepted
the job of Commission President, I promised to launch a new era of change in
the Commission. The Commission needs it. The European Parliament and Member
States have asked for it. The European public has urged us to carry it out.
This is what I intend to deliver, starting from today.".

In July 1999, management and trade unions at the RATP Parisian public
transport network reached an agreement on the means by which the company will
move to the 35-hour working week.