Students lobby for better work placement conditions

In September 2005, students on work placements launched an internet campaign against abuses in unpaid work placements in companies, as well as in central and local government agencies. This led to the establishment of the movement ‘Precarious Generation’, which seeks a legitimate status for students on work placements. In the second quarter of 2006, the government was due to enact two decrees governing these placements.

Background

In the 1970s and early 1980s, schools and universities began to develop links with the working world, in order to facilitate the transition from education to employment through work placements and vocational training courses. However, unlike vocational training placements, those involving young people in education and with qualifications have not been adequately covered by legislation, particularly in terms of:

• pay – although since 1 January 1987, the amount of lump sum payments related to work placements that form part of a higher education course have been restricted to a maximum of 30% of the statutory national minimum wage (salaire minimum interprofessionnel de croissance, SMIC) (FR0508104F);

• the length of placement;

• the number of students on placement that a company is allowed to have.

As a result, abuses and unintended effects related to the financial aspect of these placements have arisen, among two of the principal parties:

• the educational establishment – it is beneficial to include students on external placements in calculations of the total number of students as they do not cost the establishment anything, but still account for the allocation of teaching personnel and state subsidies;

• employers of private companies and state agencies – the option of work placements may be used to fill gaps in the workforce, especially when the employers are exempt from social security contributions, which is the case when the amounts paid to the student do not exceed €300.

Lack of proper monitoring

Since the 1984 act on higher education (in French), the compulsory monitoring of students on work placements by teaching staff has often not been properly adhered to, due to the lack of availability of on-the-job support and lack of interest among teachers.

The Economic and Social Council (Conseil économique et social, CES) states that there are about 800,000 students benefiting from work placements at least once during their studies, in a report on the integration of young graduates into the workforce (in French, 550 Kb PDF) published in July 2005. Placements are mainly held in service and financial sector companies, for example in advertising, consultancy, banking and publishing companies. Graduates from the top business and engineering schools do an average of three work placements before graduating, and 50% of them do more than three placements. According to a 2005 study by the Agency for the Employment of Managerial and Professional Staff (Agence pour l'emploi des cadres, APEC), 27% of graduates seeking employment have done at least four placements.

New student organisation

The idea for a movement representing students on placement started with an internet appeal in September 2005, which led to the establishment of the Precarious Generation (Génération-Précaire) movement one month later. This unique organisation does not base its activities on mass mobilisation but on the internet, and through the use of mobile phone messaging and other electronic communications.

In November 2005, Laurence Danon, Chair of the ‘new generations’ committee of the Movement of French Enterprises (Mouvement des entreprises de France, MEDEF), met with a delegation from the Génération-Précaire collective. Ms Danon recommended a ‘best practice’ charter, advocating a collective agreement on placements. The employer confederation MEDEF is not opposed to lump sum payments for placements lasting longer than three months, but rejects any minimum pay threshold, which it feels could ‘put small businesses in a difficult position’. The charter put forward by MEDEF also includes reciprocal commitments on placements for both the company and the student.

Sceptical about the impact of such a charter, Génération-Précaire is seeking a genuine status for students on work placements, which would establish their rights and responsibilities and enable:

• a fair level of pay with a minimum wage worth 50% of the SMIC;

• the status of students on work placements to be officially written into the Labour Code;

• practices that abuse the placement scheme to be brought in line with real employment contracts, under the supervision of the Labour Inspectorate (Inspection du Travail).

New provisions for students on placements

Neither MEDEF, the General Confederation of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (Confédération générale des petites et moyennes entreprises, CGPME), nor the Ministry of Labour – which is drafting a best practice guide together with the Ministry of Education – are keen on adding further regulations to the already substantial Labour Code or on turning students on placements into employees.

On 26 April 2006, a charter of student work placements (in French) was signed by the two ministries, along with the four employer confederations – MEDEF, CGPME, the Craftwork Employers’ Association (Union professionnelle artisanale, UPA) and the National Union of the Liberal Professions (Union Nationale des Professions Libérales, UNAPL) – three student organisations, and Génération-Précaire.

In the second quarter of 2006, the government is set to publish two decrees, making it compulsory for employers to:

• pay students on placements lasting more than three months a monthly rate of €360 or more, to be established by a sector-level agreement or, failing that, by decree. In return, companies will be exempt from paying social security contributions on all placements;

• sign up to an individual placement agreement that imposes the appointment of a mentor and provides for evaluation.

From the second half of 2006, all students on placements are to be protected against work-related accidents. The government also plans to introduce measures that limit placements which are not part of any education programme to a six-month period, inclusive of any renewal within that time period.

In the trade unions’ opinion, the latter measure is inappropriate since they would have preferred an outright ban on placements that are not part of university curricula. Meanwhile, the French Democratic Confederation of Labour (Confédération française démocratique du travail, CFDT) is asking for placements ‘to be covered by genuine employment contracts’.

Génération-Précaire, which has helped to publicise the problems faced by students on work placements, differs from the Spring 2006 mass movement against the first job contract (Contrat Premier Emploi, CPE) in particular areas (FR0603019I), but shares its rejection of precarious employment conditions.

Odile Join-Lambert, Institut de Recherches Économiques et Sociales (IRES)