European labour authority for a fairer European labour market

Today, the European Parliament’s Employment and Social Affairs Committee voted in favour of setting up a European Labour Authority (ELA). “This EU agency will ensure better enforcement of the European rules on labour mobility”, declared Jeroen Lenaers MEP, author of the Report.

"The European Labour Authority is badly needed. Over the past 10 years, the number of 'mobile workers' has doubled: around 17 million people in the EU are currently working in a different country than where they live or come from, and this number will only increase in the future. Unfortunately, this also leads to unfair competition and fraud, and this has not been tackled sufficiently. In the EPP Group, we think that it is therefore crucial that national labour authorities can work across borders in cooperation with other labour authorities to fight this. In the past years, we have achieved a lot to make the European labour market fairer, for example, through the Posting of Workers Directive, in which we have ensured equal pay for the same work in the same place. However, these rules need to be properly enforced as well. The creation of a European Labour Authority is an important part of this puzzle", he said. "The aim of the new authority is therefore a better enforcement of the existing rules, both at national and at European level. National labour authorities must be able to operate at European level", he continued.

The European Labour Authority will facilitate this cooperation and will also be able to play a role in conciliation procedures between Member States. "This will only work if the authority doesn’t become a toothless tiger: with this proposal we make it more difficult for Member States to not participate in these inspections without good reason". The Report calls for a more limited scope than the original proposal from the European Commission. Lenaers added: "The European Labour Authority should focus on two main issues: support for cooperation and conciliation, which is why we have cancelled a number of additional activities of the authority proposed by the European Commission."

“I am happy to see that this key element of the European Pillar of Social Rights proposed by Jean-Claude Juncker and Marianne Thyssen in 2017 is on the right track”, he concluded.