Stand up and be counted

Date: 23/01/1997

A PENDING court case is the latest catalyst for renewed concern over the European Commission's staffing practices.

Claims by nurse Isabelle Dewarichet that the Commission operates a black market in 'undeclared' labour have inspired MEPs to ask again exactly who works in the institution and under what conditions.

Dewarichet's claims are strenuously denied by the Commission but, given its zero-growth staffing policy in a context of increasing budgetary discipline as the deadline for the single currency approaches, they could strike a raw nerve.

As the demand for greater transparency in the EU intensifies, critics argue that the Commission cannot afford to be seen as a shadowy and unruly body which hires and fires according to arcane and questionable criteria.

To his credit, Personnel Commissioner Erkki Liikanen has responded to these concerns. Under pressure from the European Parliament, he recently reviewed the rules for agents temporaires (short-term workers) and the subsequent tailor-made Commission entrance exams which used to guarantee some of them jobs. Liikanen is also exerting pressure for non-Commission staff to be kept off the premises, and other reforms are in the pipeline.

But are things really changing?

The experience of the head of one small independent company as a Commission subcontractor suggests not.

“When they need people and do not have authorisation, they hire people via other companies. This month a person's wages might appear as the price of a document, the next as research costs. At one stage, we paid eight or nine people for [a Commission unit]; people with contracts for three, six or nine months. Of course, the Commission avoids social security costs and so on,” he said.

But in defence of the Commission, he added: “When they need people to help them, but are not given enough staff, they are forced to act like this. I am sure it goes on regularly.”

One of those 'semi-staff' who worked full time inside Commission headquarters tells a similar tale.

“I was paid under the table while I waited for my contract, and was told by a Commission official not to register as I would never be caught,” he explained. “I am sure I was not an isolated example.”

He also claimed that workers like him could be found in the Commission telephone book, classed as personne externe but were notably absent from official employment records.

But the Commission vehemently denies any wrongdoing.

In a letter to German Christian Democrat MEP Diemut Theato last year, the Commission's former Director-General for Personnel Frans de Koster said: “I can reassure you that the Commission provides all the necessary information relating to its relations with non-statutory staff upon request from the tax or social security authorities concerned.”

However, others privately admit that it is a common feature of Commission life. According to a 1994 book The European Commission, by Geoffrey Edwards and David Spence, an entire 'parallel' administration has emerged.

Attempts to establish precisely how many outside workers are on the Commission's payroll are made more difficult by the sheer number of different categories of personnel within the institution.

Permanent civil servants aside, there are four kinds of 'temporary agent', special counsellors, agents auxiliaires, agents intérimaires, prestataires de services, national experts and a category for nurses, crèche supervisors and doctors. Most mysterious is the 'external person', which appears to be a kind of bucket category for those left over.

The European Parliament has been fighting for years to clamp down on Commission officials using money earmarked for other policy programmes to pay extra employees.

British Conservative MEP James Elles, who is closely involved in that campaign, says there is still a need for greater transparency. “I hope that the Commission is going to make it clear what its policies are,” he said.

Calling on Steffen Smidt, the Commission's new director-general for personnel, to take action, Elles added: “I would expect him to enhance what is being done, underlining sound financial administration. That is what we have called for in the budget committee.”

Despite this pressure for change, the Dewarichet family is likely to face an uphill struggle when it comes to proving its more damning assertions.

The Commission maintains that whenever freelance employees are hired, they are informed of their duties both verbally and on a standard contract.

After that, say officials, it is up to individuals to take personal responsibility for their taxes.

It seems unlikely that anyone will support the Dewarichets' claims that in practice, short-term 'black labourers' are told not to comply with these rules.

The Dewarichets maintain that this does not mean it does not happen, but reflects the fact that it is not in the interest of most people to blow the whistle on such practices.

Firstly, going on the record and admitting to fiddling the tax authorities would be an open invitation to legal proceedings. Secondly, the Dewarichets claim, people who would not otherwise have jobs live very comfortably because of these arrangements. Finally, many Brussels employees feel that the kind of flexibility these working practices allow is essential to ensure a quick supply of staff for urgent short-term work.

One temporary employee who at present works full-time for the Commission but is paid via a sub-contractor explained: “I personally would rather see the Commission employing people on an ad hoc basis, rather than expanding what is already an unwieldy and bureaucratic structure.”

Since employing someone by the book can take as much as a year, many argue that the only way to meet demand, especially for technical jobs, is to turn a blind eye to the grey areas of staffing.

And in today's rapidly changing job market, they say, public employees are going to have to get used to methods of working long-encountered in the private sector.

On the other hand, if undercover freelancers are found to be doing jobs which would normally earn someone the perks of full-time employment, that would not look good for the Commission as the guardian of social protection especially in light of its campaign to combat black market work in EU member states.

Much of the debate comes down to a clash of ideology. Is the ideal of a long-term public servant committed to the European project tenable in the 21st century, or should more flexible arrangements be introduced with some tasks contracted out?

These questions are inspiring much soul-searching within the Commission, most recently focusing on the question of freelance translators in Scandinavia.

By its very nature, however, the exact extent of the problem the Dewarichets claim exists is almost impossible to measure.

Loek Rijnoudt, from the European Civil Servants' Federation, offered one crude way of calculating it. “I am convinced that the Commission has no complete view of how many people work there. We know that there are around 16,000 statutory officials working for the Commission, but when we send out a tract or leaflet we are obliged to print 20,000 to ensure adequate distribution. You only need to make a small calculation even accounting for national experts and so on to show things do not add up,” he said.

Rijnoudt feels that both national governments and the European Parliament are to blame for this state of affairs, since they do not provide the Commission with adequate staff.

Theato explains, however, that without names and dates, it is next to impossible to organise an investigation into improper employment. “Vague knowledge is not enough. You have to have proof,” she said.

It seems that her reticence is shared by the other MEPs who followed up Dewarichet's claims, most of whom say they were satisfied with the Commission's response.

Although Belgian Socialist MEP Raymonde Dury intends to meet the Dewarichet family, others are unlikely to pursue their claims further.

For the time being, therefore, it seems that the 'black labour' issue will continue to inspire words rather than deeds.

Should Dewarichet win her case at a Brussels industrial tribunal this spring, however, it could become a major embarrassment for Europe's civil servants.