European Commission launches a public consultation on the European pillar of social rights

According to the Treaties, the competence in social policy and employment lies first within Member States; Europe intervenes only to complement their action, and has greatly done so in the last 20 years to accompany the development of the Single Market.

The main objective of this initiative is to first identify and then develop a series of principles that are common to social legislation in all European countries. These principles, taking into account the diversity of European models and the fast-changing reality of the various European countries, will then serve as a benchmarking set to evaluate the social performance of European Member States.

To evaluate the consistency of these principles and their correspondence to the reality of European economies and societies, a large public consultation will be organized until the end of 2016, to ensure the widest participation of citizens, stakeholders and representatives of the civil society to the definition of this pillar, which will shape the structure and content of the future EU social legislation.

While on the one hand CEC European Managers welcomes this ambitious initiative that gives continuity to the commitment of this Commission to put social issues back at the center of the stage, we cannot conceal some remarks about the lack of a consultation procedure specially targeted to European social partners as well as the absence of more clarity about the legal nature and status of this initiative, and the way its implementation should take place.