Staff union poll result ‘good for reform’

Date: 06/01/2000

By Simon Taylor

THE European Commission has welcomed the outcome of last month's elections to the institution's staff unions, claiming it was a "good result for the reform process".

Officials pointed to the gains made by the largest staff association 'Union Syndicale' (US) as a sign that most personnel were in favour of Commission Vice-President Neil Kinnock's approach to reform.

US, widely seen as most supportive of Kinnock's planned changes, increased the number of seats it holds on the Brussels local staff committee by one, to ten, and now has an overall majority of 21 seats on the central staff committee.

But rival Renouveau et Démocratie (R&D), seen as the most militant of the seven staff unions and the most hostile to Kinnock's approach, also gained an extra two seats.

One of these was won by whistle-blower Paul van Buitenen, who played a crucial role in the crisis which led to the resignation of the Santer Commission in March last year.

Commission officials also point out that the results showed a clear trend for staff to vote for bigger unions to defend their interests in the forthcoming reform process.

Kinnock has already revealed that he wants to limit the number of unions with which the Commission negotiates on the basis of their share of total votes cast. If he decides on a threshold of 12.5% as expected, the executive would in future only deal with the three biggest groups - US, R&D and another mainstream union, the FFPE, which now has four seats.

The European Commission has welcomed the outcome of the December 1999 elections to the institution's staff unions, claiming it was a 'good result for the reform process'.