The Renouveau & Démocratie (R&D)-controlled majority in the Central Staff Committee (CSC) has rejected proposals from Generation 2004 to make the work of the Central Staff Committee more efficient, transparent and inclusive.
Under the guise of business continuity, it voted for the status quo, and to address none of the pressing problems that have hampered the work of the CSC for years.
Amongst other things, Generation 2004 had proposed to:
- increase effectiveness through the sharing of work and having clear responsibilities of all staff,
- improve efficiency through preparation of meetings and monitoring of decisions and actions, and
- ensure transparency through communication and openness towards stakeholders and staff.
Concrete measures then included the publication of a monthly trilingual newsletter together with an up-to-date website, the streaming of all plenary meetings and a publicly available repository of all actions and decisions agreed upon or taken by the CSC in order to document the work of the CSC and ensure proper follow-up. Last but not least, Generation 2004 proposed to limit the size of the executive board (‘bureau’) to a more manageable number. In recent months, the executive bureau meetings have increasingly become another plenary meeting with similar participants, similar discussions and a similar length.
According to analysis by Generation 2004, the work of the CSC is hampered by an increasingly heterogeneous composition of staff in terms of categories, rights and obligations in conjunction with deteriorating working conditions in terms of pay, working hours and infrastructure. At the same time, there are increasingly critical/hostile attitudes in the European Parliament and Council with respect to the role and the functioning of the European Commission. There is also little willingness on the part of HR to reach substantial compromises with staff via the social dialogue and make significant changes to HR measures and proposals. Consequently, there is little involvement, to say nothing of potential interest and trust, of staff in Staff Representation matters. Low voter turnout in elections is proof of this.
Generation 2004 will not be discouraged by this defeat though. Rather it has shown once more how important it is to have an independent staff association that does not fight for the perks of the past, but for fair and equitable employment conditions in the future. But to do so we need a CSC that works as goal-oriented and efficient as do tens of thousands of colleagues every day in the Commission.
As always, if you have questions or comments, feel free to contact us.
