*Please sign to support our note on action to take for our Kyiv colleagues* The war on Ukraine by the Russian Federation, which started on Thursday 24 February, will have a dramatic impact on the lives of our colleagues employed in Ukraine. We know that the EEAS formed a crisis-management working group for the emergency evacuation from Kabul in 2021. Generation 2004 would like to enquire whether similar arrangements have been put in place in Ukraine, if not, we strongly recommend to do it. Continue reading Please support colleagues in Kyiv, Ukraine
Petition
Please take action: sign (again) our petition in support of Contract Agents!
Remember our petition in support of Contract Agents from 2020? The one that closed 27.11.2020 with 1 415 signatures? (Thanks very much for your support!) We have one more task to ask of you! The petition is with the European Parliament (EP) and needs your input to keep moving! We need you to register at the EP website and sign the petition there. Continue reading Please take action: sign (again) our petition in support of Contract Agents!
Update: internal competition COM/AD/02/21 (AD5) – Art. 90(2) complaint
*update 18.07.2022: anyone who wishes to protest against any internal competition (e.g. COM/AST4/2022 (AST4)) can follow the same process as that set out below. Apply then appeal (as below) and then get in touch with us.*
The non-eligibility decision for COM/AD/02/21 (AD5) was sent out on 25.01.2022, please check your EPSO account.
For example, this is the decision that a member of Generation 2004 has received:
Continue reading Update: internal competition COM/AD/02/21 (AD5) – Art. 90(2) complaint
Update 25.01.2022: internal competition COM/AD/02/21 (AD5) – what’s next?
*25.01.2021Rejection letters are out, please let us know whether you took action and we can coordinate on the next steps*
Thanks to all of you who answered our December call to action in response to yet another very discriminatory internal competition (COM/AD/02/21 (AD5)) which excludes over 16 000 potentially eligible candidates. Yes, we also noticed that the ‘talent screener’ was simply a request for permission and your staff number. We have a Microsoft Teams group on this topic, come and join the discussion! Continue reading Update 25.01.2022: internal competition COM/AD/02/21 (AD5) – what’s next?
Zero net salary increase after advance in step!
When is an upgrade not an upgrade? So, you didn’t get promoted or reclassified last year, but you’re due an upgrade in step and are looking forward to the (however small) associated salary increase. The only circumstances where there is no increase in pay is in the last step in the grade: the salary there is always the same as step 1 of the next grade. So you reckon you’ll get something, right? Well… at the end of the day it might actually be nothing: zero. Continue reading Zero net salary increase after advance in step!
Internal competitions – Time for collective action!
*Please see 27.01.2021 update*
In the wake of the announcement by DG HR of yet another very discriminatory internal competition (IC), Generation 2004 organised a conference to debate the matter. According to our analysis, this IC excludes over 16 000 potentially eligible candidates. Although other institutions allow anyone who meets the education and experience criteria to take part, the Commission is definitely doing it differently. Continue reading Internal competitions – Time for collective action!
No more compulsory weekly presence in the office
DG HR announced yesterday evening (24/11/2021) that going to the office one day per week will not be an obligation any longer. Therefore, teleworking 5 days a week will be possible for all, except critical staff. However, those of you who would like to come to work can still do it!
The obligation to telework four days per week does not apply to staff:
– who cannot perform their tasks remotely;
– who have to be in the office to ensure business continuity.
You mobilized for months on this important issue, you discussed it at length on My Intracomm, you contacted us through hundreds of emails and phone calls. More than 600 of you commented Commissioner Hahn’s message that stated: “All of us in principle will be at the office at least one day a week”.
And more than 1.000 of you signed our petition to Commissioner Hahn to support our note of 16 September 2021, where we asked him to postpone the forced return to the office. Already in September, it was clear that this Commission strategy to force people back to the office could carry major risks. Continue reading No more compulsory weekly presence in the office
Promising and selling unicorns
*This article was published in November 2021 in response to promises made during Brussels, Karlsruhe and Ispra elections. Here are the Karlsruhe 2021 results.*
On allowances to cover the additional costs of teleworking and other promises
It is election time for many sites of the Commission and there are two unmistakable signs for this:
- Your inbox is filling with largely indistinguishable e-mails asking to vote for union X or union Y, because they have done SO MUCH for you in the last year (although for some of them, you cannot remember ever having seen any action or results).
- The e-mails contain a hodgepodge of measures that they are demanding, often defying any sense of reality: unicorns, rainbows, a guaranteed lottery win …
Generation 2004 submitted AST/SC petition to the European Parliament
We need you to please register at the EP website and sign this petition there.
We are happy to inform you that Generation 2004 formally submitted a petition to the European Parliament to stop the unfair treatment of AST/SC staff on 11.11.2021, but please add add your name to show your support! [1]
‘Will you support a petition to the European Parliament (EP) to raise the MEPs’ awareness of the specific challenges faced by our AST/SC colleagues and to urge the EP, during the next revision of the staff regulations, to adopt the necessary legislative changes to abolish the unfair treatment of the AST/SC staff members? Continue reading Generation 2004 submitted AST/SC petition to the European Parliament
Stop having AST/SC staff do AST roles without the corresponding pay and potential!
*Update 23.09.2025: It’s now official: 50 AST/SCs are to have the (mis)fortune of doing an AST post without the corresponding AST promotion speed or career potential. Check the Draft 2026 Commission budget: ’50 posts in the function group AST may be occupied by officials and temporary staff in the AST/SC function group to reflect the gradual phase-in of the AST/SC function group.’ (p. 955, footnote 1). While the Commission as a whole is set to lose 24 posts, the AST function group is to lose 121 (leaving 4398 permanent staff). No other function group is to decrease in size.* Continue reading Stop having AST/SC staff do AST roles without the corresponding pay and potential!
