Eurostat General Assembly of 07.01.2005: Written Questions
The A&D-L welcomes Mr Hanreich as the new Director General of Eurostat and thanks you and Commissioner Almunia for the opportunity of raising matters which currently preoccupy staff at Eurostat. We look forward to discussions and cooperation with you.
Career Development Report (CDR)
1. It has been widely recognised that the current CDR/REC procedure has not been successful and in fact has only created a lot of work for the hierarchy and demotivation for staff. Has the Director General considered setting up a task force to study the effect of the REC on staff at Eurostat and to make proposals to improve the system?
2. Currently the CDR is an authoritarian process in which only the opinion of the Reporting Officer counts toward your evaluation, while the views of your peers and of those lower in the hierarchy are discarded. Would it be worthwhile to add elements of peer-review to the CDR?
3. If a Reporting Officer awards a score below average (14 points) to one of our colleagues, is he under an obligation to provide written advice on how to improve performance during the coming year? If so, should that advice include measurable milestones so that the colleague can work towards improvement systematically?
European School and Social Infrastructure
4. The foreseen implantation of the 2nd European School in Mamer has been strongly opposed by parents. The number of hours lost and the stress involved in ferrying children to and from a school many miles from Kirchberg risk having a negative impact on staff. Mr Vanden Abeele recognised the problem and was prepared to intervene with the powers that be to have the 2nd school built nearer to Eurostat and the other European Institutions. Will the Director General support parents in this matter of mutual interest?
5. (Primarily for Commissioner Almunia)
After abolition of the temporary levy a special levy was re-imposed and will rise to 5.5% by 2011. Although it was promised (in the "Explanatory Fiches") that this levy would be used for social purposes and for the European Schools, we have since learned from Mr Kinnock that this levy is simply entered into the general budget and is not reserved for any special purpose. Moreover, since the implementation of this special levy, funding for the European schools and school-related activities has been cut. Will Commissioner Almunia work hard to convince his co-Commissioners that the funding for the European Schools should indeed be increased in order to (i) accommodate the children from the New Member States and (ii) allow the children to pursue their education (and at the same time the "idéal européen") in decent conditions?
6. Childcare is another primary concern for staff. Day-care facilities are already overcrowded and no solution has yet been found. Will the Director General make this one of his priorities and make contact with OIL on this matter?
A good social infrastructure in Luxembourg is important not only for staff but also for the future of Eurostat as an organisation. It can play an important role in attracting valid candidates to the DG.
Social dialogue and co-decision (Mitbestimmungsrecht)
7. Certain Member States (Austria, Germany for example) already have systems of co-decision for the public service that largely surpass those of the Commission. Are you willing to experiment with informal co-decision as a higher dimension of the social dialogue so that some of the shortfall in EU legislation can be compensated in practice?