Copy of `Fedee - Glossary of EU treaties and regulations`

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Fedee - Glossary of EU treaties and regulations Category: General > Glossary of EU treaties and regulations Date & country: 12/11/2010, USA Words: 132

Ratification
The formal incorporation of an EU legal measures into national legislation or the acknowledgment of an ILO convention by a member government.

Recommendation
A decision reached by the Council of Ministers that does not have the full force of a Directive. It establishes desired standards, or end results, without requiring member states to incorporate the measure into national legislation. The weaker Commission Recommendation is a measure that is not universally accepted by all EU member states.

Regulations
These are the strictest legal instruments that are issued by the Council of Ministers. They have immediate, direct and generally universal effect. Decisions made in the field of justice and home affairs may also be applied in a similar way.

Representative Office
The local office of the European Commission in individual states around the world. They normally serve the function of public and press liaison.

Resolution
Agreement by the members of an EU institution about a policy issue. It need not have direct implications for EU law.

Safety Signs
The standardization of such signs in the workplace was covered by an original Directive (1977) that was subsequently updated (1992).

Schengen Convention
agreement between several of the EU states that relaxed passport controls for everyday movement of people across national borders.

Sector Measures
Action by the European institutions in specific industrial or commercial areas (sectors) of the economy.

Short-Time Working
A reduction in regular working hours, normally due to a decline in the demand for goods or services. It may also be introduced because of a workplace emergency such as a flood or fire. Short-time working in many EU countries is subject to statutory earnings guarantees.

Single European Act (SEA)
Amendment to the Rome Treaty agreed in 1986. It extended the concept of qualified majority voting and sought to tighten up the major loopholes in the existing Treaty.

Single Market
The new trading environment established after completion of the measures contained in the Single European Act (SEA) of 1986. It was meant to be fully effective by 1.1.1992.

Smoking in Public Places
Workplaces are covered by a Council Recommendation of December 1988.

SNB
Special Negotiating Body. The committee that multinational organisations must establish, on request, if they receive a valid request from their workforce to establish a European Works Council. See European Works Councils.

Social Chapter
Article 118 of the Rome Treaty (1958). Now Article 137.

Social Charter
The forty-point programme established by the EU following the Single European Act.

Social Dialogue
The achievement of European level social and employment reforms through an 'idealised' form of collective bargaining.

Social Dumping
The process by which commercial organisations take advantage of poorer regions within the EU and perpetuate them through the provision of low paid jobs with poor working conditions.

Social Inclusion
The involvement of under-privileged groups in society as a whole. A process to combat poverty and deprivation.

Social Partnership
A concept of industrial and social harmony arising from a positive, tripartite relationship between employers, employee representatives and government.

Social Protocol
A section of the EU Treaty that deals with the extension of majority voting powers into the social and employment spheres.

Socrates
An EU educational support fund.

Strasbourg
The town in North East France originally chosen as the principal meeting place for the European Parliament. Also the home of the European Court of Human Rights.

Subcontracting
The securing of temporary labour to complete projects on terms and conditions which may be inferior to those enjoyed by permanent, direct employees.

Subsidiarity
The principle that all EU decisions should be taken at the most local level which is practicable. Only transnational matters are the domain of the European Institutions. Term much loved by former UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.

Treaty of Rome (1958)
The original Treaty signed by the seven countries that made up the European Economic Community (now called the European Union).

Unanimity
The traditional method by which ministerial decisions were reached by the Council. It required all countries to agree to a measure before it could become law.

VDU / VDT
Visual display unit / visual display terminal. Subject to a health and safety Directive agreed in 1990 (Implemented 1.1.93).

Vredling
Original proposal for the introduction of worker information and consultation procedures into multinational enterprises operating in Europe.

Whistleblower
A person who reports information which they reasonably believe to be evidence of a criminal offence, an infringement of workplace rules or other matter that should be drawn to the attention of the appropriate, accountable parties.

Working Group
A body of officials that meets 'in camera' to thrash out the details of a proposed EU measure (see COREPER).

Working Time
The set of minimum health and safety standards relating to basic hours, shift and overtime hours, rest periods and holiday entitlements. Subject to a Directive effective on the 23rd November 1996. Certain excluded sectors (such a transport operations) were excluded from the Directive, but have now largely been brought into line through a series of special measures.

Workplace Directive
A framework EU measure (1989) that laid down comprehensive, minimum health and safety standards for all workplace activities.