COTANCE
Rue Belliard 3
1040 Brussels
Tel: +32.2.512.77.03
Fax: +32.2.512.91.57

ETUF:TCL
Rue J.Stevens 8
1000 Bruxelles
Tel. +32.2.511.54.77
Fax: +32.2.511.81.54
fse.thc@skynet.be

Joint Declaration of the Social Partners of the European Leather Industry

Committee Meeting of 14/10/2005

COTANCE and ETUF:TCL, the Social partners of the Leather industry at EU level call on the European Commission to come up quickly with the necessary arrangements required in EU legislation so as to avoid the unnecessary wastage, of some 700.000 cattle hides in the UK, but also in other EU countries that represent work and income for the leather sector, securing jobs during the next 3 years.

The Social Partners of the European Leather Industry understand that the current socio-economic conditions don’t permit the industry assuming such a loss of raw materials when access to extra-EU hides and skins becomes increasingly narrow and it is an EU trade priority to open up global raw materials markets eliminating export barriers applied by trade partners.

COTANCE and ETUF:TCL understand that imposing adverse socio-economic consequences on Europe’s Leather Industry because of a clash of legislations is not acceptable and there is a general agreement by international experts that there is no significant risk from recovering and processing these hides of “cohorts” of animals that test positive for BSE..

COTANCE and ETUF:TCL insist on the urgency of solving this issue efficiently and with the necessary safeguards regarding health and safety.

See also : SUMMARY BRIEF ON HIDES FROM OLDER UK CATTLE

Workers across borders

May 2004

The EU represents the largest Single Market in the world with over 450 million citizens. However, EU enlargement to 10 new Member States has not had an immediate effect on the “freedom of movement of workers” throughout the Union. 

In the Accession Treaty, transitional measures have been concluded so that current Member States can still regulate the access to labour market via their national legislation. Therefore, workers coming from brand-new Member States are still subject to national legislation on the requirement of occupational authorisation or work permit.

General principles:

1. Under the principle of “free movement of workers”, all citizens from within the European Economic Area (EEA) have the right to work in another EEA country without a work permit. 

However, for citizens of MS that have joint the EU on 1 May 2004 (except Cyprus and Malta), access to the labour markets of the original 18 EEA Member States may be restricted for a period of 2 to 7 years, depending on the national law and policy of the original MS, and on any bilateral agreement set up with the individual new Member State. 

In practice, this means that if you recruit employees from one of the new MS, check first the national legislation of your country given that during this transitional period it is likely that they will need to obtain the work permit. For instance, in Belgium work permit is still necessary to access the labour market (except for Malta and Cyprus) till 30/04/2006.

You can find out more about the specific transitional arrangements for new MS through the EURES job mobility portal: http://europa.eu.int/eures , where you can conduct a search for your local public employment service and/or EURES adviser, or through the Public Employment Service (PES) in your country.

2. Regulated professions are restricted to people who hold certain qualifications. They include engineers, teachers. In some of these professions, a list of recognised and equivalent qualifications has been established across Europe, while in others the comparison is judged on a case-by-case basis, taking into account the course length and content.

Occupations or professions that are not regulated do not require a specific qualification (shopfloor workers). Nonetheless, an employee must observe any necessary procedures applicable to that occupation in the host country.

You can find more about the recognition of qualifications and certificates through your National Reference Point. You can find these contact details via the European Training Village- an interactive platform providing up-to-date information on vocational education and training in Europe: http://www.trainingvillage.gr/etv/