The EU-UK TCA goes beyond the diluted, and at times tokenistic, protection of multilateral labour standards contained in the other FTAs concluded by the EU, e.g. with countries like Canada or South Korea. However, the few additional labour clauses it contains, and the overall weak supervision and... Find out more

Policy recommendations The Covid-19 pandemic has affected women disproportionately and is likely to have adverse effects on gender equality. It is essential that efforts to promote gender equality be increased in order to ensure that hard-won progress in this area is not reversed. As part of this... Find out more

The Rana Plaza tragedy demonstrated the need to regulate companies which use subsidiaries, subcontractors and suppliers to carry out underpaid work, without consideration for core humanitarian principles, including trade union and workers’ rights. Structures permitting companies to profit from such... Find out more

In the coming months, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) will reach a decision on the case European Public Service Union (EPSU) and Goudriaan v Commission (C-928/19 P), which could be crucial for the future of the EU social dialogue. The EPSU case initially originated from the Commission’s refusal... Find out more

This policy brief describes the need for the sensible coordination of corporate income tax rules at international level, in particular in the context of digitalisation. In the same way that the manufacture of goods and services is fragmented along global value chains to reduce costs, corporate... Find out more

Pension policy is not safe from the potentially dramatic consequences of the pandemic. But in terms of pension politics, the pandemic also represents a window of opportunity to rethink the political debate on the future reform agenda. The present policy brief sheds light on the short- and long-term... Find out more

The forthcoming Digital Services Act package (DSA) is a legislative initiative to regulate online digital platforms, including online marketplaces, social media platforms, search engines, video gaming platforms and other information society services and internet service providers. As the first major... Find out more

Hazards from SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19, should be addressed in line with the EU Biological Agents Directive and by means of a strengthened centralised capacity of the European Union for the monitoring of and response to health emergencies. Mitigating and preventing the impact of the... Find out more

Non-financial reporting is the provision by companies of information regarding their policies that have an impact on workers, the environment and society. EU requirements for such reporting are based on Directive 2014/95/EU on the disclosure of non-financial and diversity information by certain... Find out more

The Covid-19 pandemic has shown that highly mobile workers who frequently move either within or in and out of the European Union (EU) are irreplaceable during a public health crisis. Nevertheless, they often remain the least protected and most vulnerable. Measures introduced to protect workers in... Find out more