The French government sets out new ruling regarding the labour law. The impact on staff representatives is strong as a number of existing rules have been amended.
Formerly, companies staff representatives were divided in three groups: staff delegates, the Works Council (CE), the Health and Safety Committee (CHSCT). New ruling suppresses that structure to establish a single entity: The Social and Economic Committee (CSE) and as a consequence, the number of workers representatives will drop significantly. This body will now have the possibility to negotiate company agreements in some cases without trade union involvement. Company agreements can derogate in many cases to sectoral agreements. Usual delegation time have also been reviewed, passing from 20 hours to 16 hours per month and per CSE members.
A major change occurs in the expertise costs which were, until then, supported by the company: CSE will have to support 20% of the expertise fees. Which would probably lead the smaller one to be unable to afford technical expertise anymore, hence undermining workers’ participation rights in practice.
The rules also simplify the possibilities for employers to make workers redundant individually and collectively.
