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Recommendation 1958 (2011) Final version
Monitoring of commitments concerning social rights
1. The 50th anniversary of the European
Social Charter (ETS No. 35) and the 15th anniversary of the revised
European Social Charter (ETS No. 163) will be celebrated in 2011.
On that landmark occasion for social rights in Europe, the Parliamentary
Assembly welcomes the member states’ strong support for these significant
instruments, the great majority of which have acceded to some or
all of the treaties constituting the European Social Charter.
2. The Assembly recalls that at the Warsaw Summit (2005), the
heads of state and government of the Council of Europe member states
considered that the revised European Social Charter should be regarded
as the minimum core of social rights which all member states should
guarantee. Despite this ample support for the Social Charter, ratification
of the revised Charter and of some of the protocols to the 1961
Charter must continue to be promoted at all possible levels. Moreover,
the Social Charter’s monitoring machinery must be further strengthened,
especially as regards the strict application of certain rules laid
down by the treaties. The Charter itself must continue to evolve
in its substance in order to remain, in the medium and long term,
a genuine social rights reference for member states.
3. The Assembly regards the year 2011 as a cardinal year and
a propitious time to remind all parties and bodies involved of the
importance of the Social Charter mechanisms for the protection of
social rights. The essential role assigned by the Social Charter
to the Assembly with regard to the relevant monitoring mechanisms
and the need to increase its real contribution in this respect by
means of proactive steps should also be recalled in this context.
4. Recalling its own commitments made in Resolution 1792 (2011)
on the monitoring of commitments concerning social rights, the Assembly
accordingly calls upon the Committee of Ministers to:
4.1. acknowledge that social rights
are indivisible from human rights and continue promoting their fulfilment
through firm recommendations addressed to member states in the framework
of the supervisory process related to the European Social Charter;
4.2. continue promoting the revised European Social Charter
among the member states which have not yet ratified this authoritative
instrument on modern social rights;
4.3. continue encouraging member states which have not ratified
the 1995 Additional Protocol Providing for a System of Collective
Complaints (ETS No. 158) to do so, and to ask them to secure to national
non-governmental organisations the right to submit such complaints,
following the good practice of Finland;
4.4. urge the four Parties to the European Social Charter which
have not yet ratified the Amending Protocol of 1991 (ETS No. 142)
(known as the “Turin Protocol”) – namely, Denmark, Germany, Luxembourg
and the United Kingdom – do so as soon as possible, to allow proper
application of the monitoring system prescribed by the Charter and
to allow, finally, for the election of the 15 members of the European
Committee of Social Rights by the Assembly;
4.5. if the Turin Protocol does not come into force by June
2012, ensure that the Assembly can fully discharge its appointed
function in the Charter’s monitoring machinery as of 2013 by adopting
a unanimous decision to that effect as was done on previous occasions
to ensure the application of other provisions of the Turin Protocol;
4.6. revise the collective complaints procedure provided for
by the Additional Protocol of 1995 so as to allow the Assembly and
other stakeholders to intervene as a third party where appropriate.
5. Finally, the Assembly recommends that the Committee of Ministers
take into account the results of the political monitoring which
the Assembly will conduct in the coming years concerning the application
of the Social Charter in the member states, including a general
review of the development of social rights in the member states
and a follow-up to the European Committee of Social Rights’ decisions
on the merits of collective complaints.