MOTION FOR A RESOLUTION BY THE COMMITTEE ON EMPLOYMENT AND SOCIAL AFFAIRS (EMPL)

Give Us a Job: As the record high employment rates following the Covid-19 pandemic are largely driven by an increase in precarious work, such as zero -hour contracts and involuntary part-time employment, how should the EU and its Member States provide adequate and fair working conditions for all workers?

Submitted by: Marium Abdelaziz (FI), Manuela Barbarić (CH), Dávid Gábor Erős (Perhon lukio), Miska Jär venpää (Tampereen lyseon lukio), Ava Lindfors (Gymnasiet Lärkan), Veera Mertala (Tampereen lyseon lukio), Roger Penter (Novidan, Loimaan lukio), Phuc Tran (Mäntän Lukio), Vini Venetvaara (FI), Yupar Win Thu (Mäntän lukio), Ida Eerola (Chairperson, FI)

The European Youth Parliament aims to protect the rights of workers and the unemployed to secure their financial stability and physical and mental wellbeing. The EU should prioritise enhancing its employment and social policy to tackle injustices such as poor working conditions, unfair employment contracts and lack of protection for workers. The end goal is to establish an environment in which workers can safely work and enjoy the fruits of their labour, because:

A. Employees can be wrongly classified as self-employed and therefore lack access to workersʼ rights such as sick pay and holiday pay,

B. A s zero-hour contracts lead to var ying working hours and income, the individuals solely 5 relying on such contracts face increased financial insecurity,

C. Despite there being support to outright ban zero-hour contracts, they can still work as a flexible way to earn money for those who do not rely on them as a main source of income,

5 Zero-hour contract is not a legal term, yet it is a commonly used term for employment contracts that have no guarantee of the number or the frequency of working hours.

D. Research shows that poor working conditions can lead to health complications such as poor mental health, which can have negative consequences to the company,

E. Due to requirements to receive unemployment benefits in many Member States, job-seekers may be pressured to rapidly take up insecure employment,

F. There is variation in the definitions of disability and disability benefits among Member States,

G. Vulnerable employees, such as migrants, may not have adequate knowledge of their rights as a worker,

H. Circumstances such as strict trade union legislation or the nature of a job can make collective workplace action, such as strikes, increasingly difficult;

1. Calls upon the European Council to harmonise definitions used by Member States in employment law, including the definition of a zero-hour contract;

2. Further calls upon the European Council to create EU-wide requirements to be able to classify an individual as self-employed;

3. A sks Member States to implement legislation that only allows zero-hour contracts under certain circumstances such as second jobs, emergencies and short-term cover in the case of illness;

4 Suggests Member States improve social security safety nets for precarious workers by considering: a. further trials of Universal Basic Income (UBI) , 6 b. improving the accessibility of applying for and retaining unemployment benefits as needed;

5. Proposes Member States to implement disability benefits that are not subject to means-testing or sanctions;

6 Universal Basic Income (UBI) refers to recurring financial support from the state to all individuals universally without any means-testing

Turku 2023 – National Session of the European Youth Parliament Finland General Assembly, 10 April 2023

6. Urges the European Commission, in social dialogue with the relevant business and worker representatives, to introduce guidelines protecting the right of workers in ever y profession to go on strike safely;

7 Encourages Member States, together with the social partners , to increase awareness of 7 workersʼ rights and unionisation by: a. including information on workersʼ rights and unions in school curricula, b. improving the accessibility of information on workersʼ rights and unions, c. promoting workersʼ rights and unionisation through media campaigns;

8. Requests the European Commission to create guidelines with the aim of requiring complete transparency on employment contracts, following from the example of the Directive on Pay Transparency.

7 Social partners are groups that cooperate in working relationships to achieve a mutually agreed-upon goal, typically for the benefit of all involved groups. Examples of social partners include employers, employees, trade unions, and governments