The European Community's Charter of Fundamental Social Rights of Workers

Abstract

On December 8-9, 1989, the Member States of the European Community gathered together in the European Council at Strasbourg, solemnly declared, with the sole dissent of the United Kingdom, a Charter of Fundamental Social Rights of Workers.' The development of the 1992 programme carried with it increasing concern about the social consequences of the creation of the single internal market. The social policy of the Community, as developed over its first 30 years, did not seem adequate to the task.2 An attempt to overcome the stalemate preventing the Council approving many Commission proposals on social policy was made by the launching in 1985 of the Val Duchesse 'social dialogue' between the European level trade union and employers' organisations (ETUC and UNICE),3 reinforced by the provision in Article 118B of the Treaty inserted by the Single European Act. But this effort did not satisfy the perceived need for the formulation and implementation of a comprehensive social dimension for the 1992 programme. Building upon the Belgian Presidency (the Labour and Social Affairs Council of May 1987) and an Opinion of the Economic and Social Committee (the Beretta report of November 1987),4 a working party of the Commission in 1988 proposed a body of minimum social provisions.5 Thereafter, the development was very rapid: following an Opinion of the Economic and Social Committee in February 19896 and a Resolution on Fundamental Rights of the European Parliament in March 1989,7 a first draft of a Community Charter of Fundamental Social Rights was published by the Commission in May 1989, a second draft was produced in October 1989 and the December summit approved the final Charter.8 Shortly before that summit, the Commission had produced a communication concerning its Action Programme relating to the implementation of the Community Charter.9