Practically in the last minute, eleven Member States have made use of the option to issue a “yellow card” against the new proposal in respect of the Posting of Workers Directive and in doing so blocked it. Almost in unity, they oppose the principle of equal pay for equal work at the same workplace and demand that the EU Commission withdraws its proposal. It is little surprising that ten out of the eleven Member States are from Eastern Europe.

Following weeks of intensive debates concerning the proposal of the Commission regards manda-tory automatic exchange of information in the field of taxation by the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs and the Special Committee on Tax Rulings of the European Parliament, this week, the Plenum of the European Parliament voted on the proposal.

Proposal of the Commission

Recent months have shown that the EU rules, which regulate the responsibilities of the Member States for asylum applications (the so-called Dublin System), are not suitable to guarantee sustainable EU-wide burden sharing and the processing of asylum applications in a timely manner. Hence, on 6th April 2016, the Commission has initiated a process to reform the Dublin System. The Commission presented relevant proposals on 4th May 2016, which were debated in the European Parliament on 11th May 2016.

Reform of the Common European Asylum System

At a joint discussion event hosted by AK EUROPA, ÖGB Europabüro, the European Office of the Austrian Trade Union Federation and DGB, the German Confederation of Trade Unions the issue was debated by Stefan Körzell, Member of the Federal Management Board, DGB, Ronald Janssen, Chief Economic Analyst of TUAC-OECD and Philipp Rother, Chief Economic Analyst, Cabinet of Vice President Valdis Dombrovskis.

By introducing competitiveness councils, the EU continues to follow wrong recipes

The new Spring Economic Forecast, which was presented by Pierre Moscovici, Commissioner for Economic and Financial Affairs, this week, once again shows that the European economy, eight years after the outbreak of the crisis, has not been making any headway. In spite of a slight in-crease in growth, the situation on the labour market and the income situation of low earning households remain difficult.

As a reaction to the VW emissions scandal, an enquiry committee was set up in the EU Parliament last month. The purpose of the committee is to clarify who is responsible for what failings.

Is it possible to reliably exclude public services from free trade agreements such as TTIP, CETA or TiSA? A new study by Prof. Markus Krajewski picks up on the current challenges by these agreements of the “new generation” and develops a model clause for the protection of public services.

By voting on a part of the Anti Tax Avoidance Package, which has been presented by the European Commission, the European Parliament has taken a step further towards more tax transparency. It now rests with the Council to take the last hurdle for the Automatic Exchange of Information.

Content of the vote

8 years after the outbreak of the financial crisis, the European Union, in particular the Eurozone, has still not recovered. The future of the joint currency is uncertain. Against this background, the Com-mittee on Economic and Monetary Affairs has asked the following questions in two working docu-ments: is a joint budget needed for the Eurozone and if yes, how should it be structured?

Historical context

This week, the Communication from the European Commission on the new Single Market Strategy was a key subject of the Committee on the Internal Market and Consumer Protection in the European Parliament. MEPs voted on a respective report, which welcomes the Commission plans.

Short explanation of the Single Market Strategy

Last year, the European Commission presented its new Single Market Strategy, in which it focusses among other on the following topics: