Euro-MP welcomes new worker consultation laws

12.00.00am BST (GMT +0100) Mon 7th Jul 2003

West Midlands Liberal Democrat MEP Liz Lynne has welcomed today's announcement by the Department of Trade and Industry to introduce new laws giving employees new rights to information and consultation.

The new laws are being introduced because of the Information and Consultation Directive, which was agreed by the European Council and Parliament last year. The Directive ensures that workers in companies with 50 staff or more have the right to be consulted regularly on developments affecting the business.

This would cover information on proposed job cuts/expansions, new business plans or proposed changes to staff contracts, before decisions are taken.

Liz Lynne, a Lib Dem member of the Parliament's Employment and Social Affairs Committee was heavily involved in negotiating the final wording of the Directive. Welcoming the UK Government's decision to begin formal consultation on how best to implement the Directive, she said:

"Timely consultation of workers helps the effective management of a company. Recently we have had to witness many workers affected by large-scale redundancies discovering their fate in the pages of the press."

"One only needs to look at the furore over the decision to close down the Alstom factory in Birmingham - making 1,000 people redundant - for example."

"The Directive strikes a balance between the need for employees to know how secure their jobs are going to be in the future and the rights of employers not to disclose confidential information that could damage their business."

"I am pleased that instead of the stringent measures originally proposed by the Commission for employers who break the obligations in this Directive, we agreed a set of measures that are effective, dissuasive and proportionate to the nature of the infringement."

"It is now up to the UK Government to ensure that they maintain this balance in UK legislation and avoid the temptation to 'gold plate' the Directive with unnecessary detail. The future prosperity of the West Midlands region depends on it."