This week, ÖGB Europabüro, the Brussels Office of the Austrian Federation of Trade Unions together with AK EUROPA, the Brussels Office of the Austrian Federal Chamber of Labour and British and Swedish trade unions hosted a panel discussion on “BREXIT”.

It took less than seven months for the EU Commission, the EU Parliament and The Council of the European Union to agree to a so-called Interinstitutional Agreement (IIV), which will revise the cooperation of the three EU institutions to guarantee better legislation in future. Following an initial review, many concerns of employees and the civil society have been taken on board.

Presentation from Martin Risak at AK EUROPAs event: "Modern-Day challenges for the European Trade Union movement"

The Commission’s proposal for the chapter on sustainability only contains non-binding measures to improve the exchange of information and collaboration. It basically only repeats, confirms and lists existing obligations under the ILO’s core labour standards. The BAK regrets that the EU Commission’s proposal does not even stipulate as an objective that the ILO core labour standards should be ratified.

This week, AK EUROPA, the Brussels Office of the Austrian Federal Chamber of Labour and ÖGB Europabüro, the Brussels Office of the Austrian Federation of Trade Unions hosted a panel discussion on the subject of data protection in the 21st century. New technologies provide companies with increasingly more options to monitor and analyse their (potential) customers without their knowledge.

In accordance with its 2015 Work Programme, the EU Commission decided this week to withdraw the Maternity Leave Directive - a proposal, which would have led to the improved reconciliation between work and family life. However, in this case one cannot pass the blame onto the EU Commission; it is rather a question of the gap between the ideas of EU Parliament and Member States being too wide. The negotiations lasted seven years - unfortunately to no avail.

Last week, AK EUROPA, the Brussels Office of the Austrian Federal Chamber of Labour and ÖGB Europabüro, the Brussels Office of the Austrian Federation of Trade Unions hosted a high calibre panel discussion on the issue of regulatory cooperation in TTIP. Subject of the debate were the so-called non-tariff barriers to trade, which are to be reduced in the “novel” trade agreements TTIP and CETA by intensive cooperation of the legislators.

German Only - Erfassung, Verknüpfung und Verwertung persönlicher Daten im Zeitalter von Big Data: Internationale Trends, Risiken und Herausforderungen anhand ausgewählter Problemfelder und Beispiele.

Since the beginning of this week, it is possible to ask MEPs within the scope of the AK EUROPA campaign “NO 2 ISDS” directly via email or Twitter in various languages to publicly commit against private investment arbitration courts (ISDS), which would give foreign companies unjustified privileges. We therefore once again ask for your support: visit our campaign homepage www.no2isds.eu and contact as many MEPs as possible with only a few clicks!

Join us in asking MEPs directly via Twitter and e-mail to say NO 2 ISDS!

Die Dienststellen der Europäischen Kommission haben Ende Februar 2015 den Länderbericht Österreich 2015 vorgelegt. Angesichts der Tatsache, dass diese Arbeitsunterlage eine wichtige Grundlage für die Annahme der länderspezifischen Empfehlungen im Mai 2015 darstellt, nimmt die Bundesarbeitskammer (BAK) zu ausgewählten Kapiteln Stellung.