Whistleblower protection in focus at Eurocadres General Assembly

In his opening speech, President Martin Jefflén highlighted the work on EU-wide whistleblower protection, when speaking about the successful work of Eurocadres together with other trade union organisations and NGOs on the trade secrets directive:

–The final outcome on whistleblowers in the directive also prompted us to get active on pushing for an EU-wide whistleblower protection. This is at the top of our agenda right now and we are working on establishing a platform for campaigning for this.

In the resolution on EU-wide whistleblower protection (see full text here) Eurocadres writes:

Eurocadres was very active in the work on the trade secrets directive. One of the outcomes was a partial exception from the directive for whistleblowing activities. In Eurocadres’ view this is not enough. It is professionals and managers, our members, that most come in contact with information in companies and other organisations that sometimes needs to be disclosed in the public interest. The persons that take responsibility to act should be protected. It is time for an EU-wide whistleblower protection.

Eurocadres is now gathering trade unions and NGOs to sign a joint platform statement on EU-wide whistleblower protection. All organisations interested in signing are asked to contact Eurocadres.

It is professionals and managers, our members, that most come in contact with information in companies and other organisations that sometimes needs to be disclosed in the public interest. The persons that take responsibility to act should be protected. It is time for an EU-wide whistleblower protection.

The main debate on the annual report highlighted the developments of Eurocadres during the past year, in particular in communication and advocacy. The 2013 Congress of Eurocadres decided on a organisational development in the resolution titled Stronger Impact. The annual report concluded that now much of this strategy is implemented.

An initiative of some member organisations in France, Italy and Spain was also their joint declaration on EU and the trade unions' role in EU. The debate highlighted that we must work even more together to put forward an alternative. The future of Europe lies in a strong cooperation and not a European Union on the decline and with nationalist and populist responses. Stronger cooperation must also be the trade union response, underlining that it is also important that we allow space to understand our respective national situations.

Eurocadres' President Martin Jefflén also spoke in his opening speech on the launch of the website and new visual identity and the work on engaging members in creating Eurocadres events in different countries:

–We have a more modern look and we have a far better platform to communicate with members, media, decision makers and other visitors to our website.

Ludger Ramme, President of CEC European Managers and guest speaker, highlighted the importance of working together and mutually recognise each other's organisations and proposed a cooperation on working with managers' issues towards the European Parliament.

The annual report stated that the cooperation both with ETUC and CEC European Managers has improved during the last year.