By introducing a package of measures, the Commission wants to ensure safer products, a step, which would in particular benefit the consumer. The current product safety regulations are fragmented and insufficient. Two new legislative acts and an action plan shall remedy the situation.

It should be considered a matter of course that not only Labour and Employment Ministers are involved in tackling the problems of youth unemployment, but also Education ministers. Their meeting today in Brussels will be totally devoted to the fight against youth unemployment. It is expected that the so-called conclusions on education investments will be adopted.

The future development of consumer and employee-related data protection in Europe is an issue of particular interest to the Federal Chamber of Labour (BAK).

The latest figures published by the Statistical Office of the European Communities Eurostat are speaking volumes: almost 26 million people were unemployed in December 2012. In particular the situation for young people is devastating in many countries – in Greece, youth unemployment has now reached 57.6 percent. Since yesterday, 7 February 2013, the EU heads of government have restarted their negotiations on the future EU budget for the period 2014 to 2020.

Five years ago, the REACH Regulation was adopted in order to ensure that chemical substances would become safer. The aim is among other to replace the most dangerous chemicals by less hazardous substances. So far, companies have registered 7,884 chemical substances with the European Chemicals Agency. The costs for registering chemicals were 2.1 billion Euros at the end of 2012.

Until now, the performance comparison between universities mainly focussed on excellent research achievements. However, the new university ranking “U-Multirank” is to change this. In future, universities will be rated according to a broader range of factors, in five categories: reputation for research; quality of teaching and learning; international orientation; success in knowledge transfer; and contribution to regional growth. Universities have now been invited to register for the new ranking in the first half-year 2013.

Do the interests of a few major corporations take priority over the needs of society? Recently, this has been a frequent question asked at the level of EU institutions. One of these occasions was yesterday when the Internal Market Committee in the European Parliament voted on the Directive on the award of concession contracts: this rather technical sounding title conceals another attempt by the European Commission to make public supply of water, healthcare services and other vital public services significantly more difficult.

If the Commission had its way, a so-called basic factsheet will in future provide small investors interested in financial products with more comprehensive and better information on investment products. This is aimed at increasing consumer protection for small investors. This week now, the Commission proposal was discussed in the European Parliament.

The recently published report on Employment and Social Developments in Europe 2012 reveals a sobering truth about the past year. Record unemployment, increasing poverty as well as a growing number of young people without education and a job are a burden on the Member States. At the same time, there are unprecedented social differences between the Member States. The European Commission gives a pessimistic forecast for 2013.

This week, the rapporteur in the European Parliament presented his draft report on the EU Data Protection Regulation. Almost a year has passed since the Commission presented its proposal. The European Parliament took its time to get a clear picture. According to the Green MEP and rapporteur Jan Philipp Albrecht “The new EU Regulation will strengthen the rights of consumers”. However, the focus is also clearly on the often neglected, very important protection of employee data. The negotiations in the European Parliament have just begun.