Publications

Luxembourg has continued to experience a period of economic growth. The
public debt accounted for 6.7% of GDP in 1997, and projections for 1998 are
in the order of 7.7%. Eurostat calculates a public spending surplus of 1.7%
in 1997 and the state budget for 1998 is virtually balanced. The population
is 418,300 (of whom 142,800 are foreigners), while total employment stood at
224,000 at the end of 1997, of whom 63,200 are cross-border workers.
Unemployment is rising slowly and stood at 3.6% at the end of 1997. The rate
of inflation was 1.4% in 1997.

On 15 December 1997, the employers' association for newspaper publishers,
Bundesverband Deutscher Zeitungsverleger (BDZV) and the two trade unions
which organise journalists, IG Medien and Deutscher Journalisten-Verband
(DJV), signed new collective agreements for the 17,000 or so journalists on
daily newspapers. The negotiations, lasting more than three months, were
overshadowed by strong demands for further cost reductions by the employers
on the one hand, and accompanied by several union protest actions and warning
strikes (Warnstreiks) on the other hand. Finally, the collective bargaining
parties agreed on the following provisions:

A confidential interim report into industrial and employee relations in An
Post, Ireland's state-owned postal company, highlights the adversarial nature
of its industrial relations structures and practices and how these are
inhibiting the development of a more customer focused business. The report,
which was submitted to the company's chair, Stephen O'Connor, in February
1997 was carried out by a subsidiary of the Irish Business and Employers
Confederation (IBEC) - Employee Relations Services (ERS). It was featured in
the industrial relations weekly, /Industrial Relations News/, in December
1997.

Meeting in Brussels on 15 December 1997, the Council of Labour and Social
Affairs Ministers unanimously adopted a Directive to implement the framework
agreement on part-time work [1] concluded by the Union of Industrial and
Employers' Confederations of Europe (UNICE), the European Centre of
Enterprises with Public Participation and of Enterprises of General Economic
Interest (CEEP) and the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) on 6 June
1997 (EU9706131F [2]). This agreement aims to institute the principle of
non-discrimination for part-time workers and to facilitate the development of
part-time work on a voluntary basis and to contribute to the flexible
organisation of working time in a manner which takes into account the needs
of employers and workers. It also seeks to ensure that the equal treatment of
part-time workers in terms of pay (pro rata) and working conditions is
applied, unless there are "objective reasons" for differential treatment.
Clause 5 of the agreement calls upon Member States to review any obstacles
which may limited opportunities for part-time work and, where appropriate, to
eliminate them.

[1] http://europa.eu.int/comm/employment_social/soc-dial/social/parttime_en.htm
[2] www.eurofound.europa.eu/ef/observatories/eurwork/articles/undefined/social-partners-reach-framework-agreement-on-part-time-work

Dismissed trade union delegates and the management of Boston Scientific, a
medical equipment company which relocated operations from Belgium to Ireland
in 1997, are still fighting it out in the Belgian courts at the end of the
year. This legal battle is part of a union strategy to fight closures and
relocations carried out by multinationals.

In December 1997, an agreement was signed by Electrolux-Zanussi and
metalworkers' trade unions, aimed at increasing productivity and keeping all
of the group's Italian plants in operation.

In December 1997, the Council of Ministers adopted the bill aimed at putting
into effect the French Government's plan to reduce the statutory working week
to 35 hours.

The leaders of the Norwegian Federation of Trade Unions (LO) and the
Federation of Norwegian Professional Associations (AF), Yngve Hågensen (LO)
and Magne Songvoll (AF), made headlines on 1 December 1997 when they called
for their members to boycott Norway's largest commercial bank, Den Norske
Bank (DnB). This followed DnB's decision to introduce new service charges and
to raise existing service charges from 1 November 1997. This is only the
latest of many clashes between the trade unions and the banking sector in
Norway on the issue of service charges. An opinion poll commissioned by LO
and AF revealed that a majority of the people asked expressed dissatisfaction
with existing service charges in the banking sector in general. The proposed
boycott was not directed at the DnB alone, but the bank was made the main
target due to its size and the scale of its service fees. DnB later
reconsidered its original decision, and decided to lower charges on some
services.

The introduction of a statutory National Minimum Wage (NMW) was one of the
commitments of the Labour Government that came to power in May 1997
(UK9704125F [1]), and the National Minimum Wage Bill was published on 27
November and received its first reading in Parliament. Margaret Beckett, the
President of the Board of Trade, who is responsible for the bill, said that
it would set the framework within which the Government would introduce the
NMW, once it had carefully considered the recommendations of the Low Pay
Commission [2] (LPC). The bill, she stated, will enable the Government to
introduce a NMW which is as simple and universal as possible (UK9711177F
[3]).

[1] www.eurofound.europa.eu/ef/observatories/eurwork/articles/undefined-labour-market/the-industrial-relations-consequences-of-the-new-labour-government
[2] http://www.dti.gov.uk/lowpay/
[3] www.eurofound.europa.eu/ef/observatories/eurwork/articles/undefined-social-policies/the-national-minimum-wage-an-update

According to the Federal Statistical Office (Statistisches Bundesamt), German
real GDP grew at a rate of 2.2% in 1997. As regards the Maastricht
convergence criteria, the budget deficit reached 2.7% of GDP, whereas public
debt amounted to 61.3% of GDP. On average, unemployment stood at 11.4% of the
civilian labour force - 9.8% in the west and 18.1% in the east. Inflation, as
measured by the consumer price index, amounted to 1.8%.