Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-06-20-Speech-3-007"
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"Madam President, honourable Members, I should like to thank Mrs Oomen-Ruijten for her dedication and hard work in drawing up this report.
If one were to analyse the positive progress and the challenges that we were supposed to have resolved with the development of this directive, it is rather disappointing that at this moment not all Member States in the Council were able to reach an agreement or compromise regarding the elements of this important directive. It is encouraging, however, that the report we are debating today coincides substantially on many issues with the Commission’s opinion. In my view, there is therefore a genuine possibility of reaching agreement with the Council in the near future.
Honourable Members, although the most recent Council negotiations did not reach a conclusion, I feel that every participant can confirm that there was a strong desire to reach agreement and that the Council still shares this desire, which will provide a basis for further progress. Reflecting that spirit of cooperation, I should like to highlight two of the main points of divergence between Parliament and the Council, on which we shall have to negotiate a consensus. The first of these is the key point of the recognition of supplementary rights and what the minimum conditions should be.
I take great interest in the amendments and the decision to focus the legislation on workers over 25. There is a great deal of empirical evidence to show that mobility in this age group is significantly lower than that of younger people, so your amendment is eminently sensible. I am also aware that the Council will not look favourably on the idea of excluding the recognition of rights for those above 25, so this could be one of the areas in which negotiation and compromise are required. Your attempts to reduce obstacles must, however, be applauded and I feel that this is certainly the right way forward.
The second issue that will probably need to be debated between Parliament and the Council is that of the scope of the directive. As regards existing rights and the date by which the directive is to be transposed into national law, the Commission fully supports the substance of the amendments to Article 2 and believes that they are proportionate and sensible. The Commission firmly believes that any restrictions to the scope and thus the effectiveness of the directive should be minimised and supports Parliament in this regard. The recent technical amendment to Article 5 of the report is a reasonable clarification that should prevent misunderstandings over how entitlements should be protected. Article 5 is a key part of this directive and is vital to the aim of removing the barriers to worker mobility.
I should like, if I may, to tell the Members of this Chamber once again that there is no proposal in this directive that would lay down any method for protecting these rights. It is more a question of ensuring that mobile workers are treated fairly in terms of their deferred pension rights. Given the way in which the labour market is developing, and how active working life is gradually being extended, I feel that when we speak about mobile workers, we are actually talking about all workers, because over the course of a career there is absolutely no doubt that most workers change jobs at least once, and will be able to take advantage of the protection that the proposed directive will afford. As for transposing the directive into national law, we share your view that this should happen as soon as possible. At the same time, however, we recognise that any amendments to the directive should not hinder the provision of supplementary pensions in the EU.
Lastly, I warmly welcome the proposals contained in Article 10, the substance of which I wholeheartedly support. The removal of Article 6 on the transferability of rights is, in my view, regrettable. The amendments to Article 10 contained in the report, however, send out a clear message that this complex and highly specialised issue has not been forgotten but merely postponed. In the meantime, the Commission, in conjunction with Parliament and the social partners, is looking into ways in which it would be possible effectively and sustainably to remove any remaining obstacles to mobility in terms of supplementary pension schemes.
Honourable Members, this directive was, politically and intellectually, exceptionally complex, not to mention the complicated nature of the whole concept of the policy. The proposed directive very much forms part of our response to demographic change, because it is clear that supplementary systems will play an increasingly important role in that response. The directive also forms part of the concept of flexicurity, because its method is a typical example of greater mobility allied to responsible social protection. I also feel that this directive generally falls within the overall concept of European social policy, that is to say, at no time and nowhere in the EU should workers be placed in a detrimental situation.
Honourable Members, once again, I would like to thank you for the work that Parliament has done in negotiating this directive.
The report has taken a great deal of hard work, drawing on the combined efforts of the Committee on Employment and Social Affairs along with the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs and the Committee on Women’s Rights and Gender Equality, and it represents an important basis for further discussion with a view to reaching a final agreement on this essential directive, which is amply justified in the context of the relaunched Lisbon Strategy and social protection for migrant workers and workers in general who move around the labour market.
In addition to the report itself, I welcome the atmosphere in which Parliament has worked with the Commission and the Council, as this has given us the best possible chance of reaching agreement at first reading.
I should like to take this opportunity to congratulate the German Presidency on their work in addressing this issue and on making genuine progress.
The challenge which this directive presents to the German pension system should not be understated and it is to the credit of the German Presidency and Vice-Chancellor Müntefering that such progress could be made. I must share with you my disappointment, however, that despite all of these efforts agreement has not been reached this time at first reading. I do believe, though, that the constructive approach that has thus far emerged will soon lead to the directive being adopted. This will have a real impact on the obstacles to mobility created by some supplementary pension schemes.
Honourable Members, I should like to stress once again that this directive is not just a collection of words; it directly affects millions of workers who change jobs in the modern labour market and take advantage of the opportunities presented by supplementary pensions. Given that 40% of workers have an employment relationship of under five years, it is clear how important our task is and how important this directive is.
Before I get on to the substance of the report, I should briefly like to recap the purpose and the need for a European approach to this issue. The Commission, the Members of this Chamber, the Council and the social partners have long expressed their dissatisfaction with the glaring inadequacy of the rights and protection conferred on mobile workers as regards the link between their statutory pension contributions and their supplementary pension contributions. As long ago as 1992, the Council urged the Member States to support changes to the conditions attached to supplementary pension rights, so that obstacles to worker mobility could be removed. The concept of obstacles to worker mobility of employees is relatively common, but in principle it means that when you are mobile, you lose out. Under existing schemes, when migrating workers change jobs they are, to a greater or lesser extent, disadvantaged. This sometimes happens almost imperceptibly, but they are never in the same position, with the same advantages as they would have enjoyed had they not decided to change and become mobile.
The first step to achieving this goal was Directive 98/49/EC. It was clear, though, that this directive failed to resolve those issues that, according to the experts in the field, have a particularly detrimental effect on mobility, namely the acquisition and protection of deferred pension rights and the portability of these rights. The proposed directive on the portability of rights in supplementary pensions was not drawn up on a whim, but following a long period of thorough negotiation and consultation, and not without reason. Although at the start the social partners were called on to table proposals, as befitting their fundamental role in providing supplementary pensions, it was quickly demonstrated that the only way of making progress was by means of a targeted legislative approach, with the opinions of the social partners and the key participants taken into account.
A targeted approach of this nature – one that recognises not only the enormous diversity and indeed, on occasion, the rapid development of supplementary pension systems, but also the voluntary nature of these systems – was, and still is, the right way to address this complex and emotive issue. This explains why the Commission prudently decided not to launch the harmonisation process but rather to establish minimum requirements. Apart from this, one of our biggest challenges is to strike the right balance between removing the barriers to mobility and ensuring that the current stable and sustainable environment for the development of supplementary pensions is retained."@en1
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