Activities of Miriam LEXMANN related to 2021/2165(INI)
Plenary speeches (1)
A new EU strategic framework on health and safety at work post 2020 (continuation of debate)
Amendments (20)
Amendment 9 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 13 a (new)
Citation 13 a (new)
— having regard to the European Agency for Safety and Health at Work (EU-OSHA) report of 22 October 2021 entitled ´Telework and health risks in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic: evidence from the field and policy implications´,
Amendment 13 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 15 a (new)
Citation 15 a (new)
— having regard to its resolution of 20 October 2021 with recommendations to the Commission on protecting workers from asbestos3a; __________________ 3a Text adopted P9_TA(2021)0427
Amendment 30 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital A b (new)
Recital A b (new)
Ab. whereas the proportion of older workers is increasing, whereas this ageing workforce presents new challenges and demands with regard to the organisation of work and the workplace; whereas ageing is accompanied by a higher risk of developing chronic mental and physical health problems, including disabilities and illnesses;
Amendment 31 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital A b (new)
Recital A b (new)
Ab. whereas persons with disabilities, chronic diseases or those recovering from injury or illness request individualised support and adaptation of the workplace when they wish to participate at the labour market;
Amendment 38 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital C
Recital C
C. whereas exposure to asbestos claims around 88 000 lives in Europe annually, accountingwhereas although asbestos has been banned in the EU since 2005, it is still present in many administrative buildings, schools, housing, infrastructure, public-transport facilities and water supply networks; whereas 80 % of occupational cancers recognised in the Member States are asbestos related; whereas exposure to asbestos accounts for 55-75 % of lung cancers developed at work, and whereas asbestos is the main cause of lung cancer, responsible for 45 % of cases6 ; whereas it is estimated that mortality rates from this exposure will continue to increase into the late 2020s and the 2030s7 ; __________________ 6Takala, J., Working paper – ‘Eliminating occupational cancer in Europe and globally’, 2015, p. 6. 7‘Global Asbestos Disaster’, International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2018).
Amendment 55 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital D
Recital D
D. whereas over a quarter of workers in Europe experience excessive work- related stress; whereas stress, anxiety or depression belong to the second largest group of self-reported work-related health problems7a, whereas 51 % of EU workers say stress is common in their workplace and nearly 80 % of managers are concerned about work-related stress8 ; whereas there are significant variations between the Member States’ legislation on psychosocial risks; __________________whereas work-related stress can significantly increase the risk of triggering and exacerbating various health problems and diseases including psychological problems, heart diseases, autoimmune diseases or musculoskeletal disorders and rheumatic /chronic inflammatory diseases; __________________ 7aEurostat: Self-reported work-related health problems and risk factors - key statistics, 2020 8‘Psychosocial risks in Europe: Prevalence and strategies for prevention’, Eurofound and EU-OSHA, 2014, Publications Office of the European Union, Luxembourg.
Amendment 66 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E
Recital E
E. whereas the COVID-19 pandemic has caused a rapid increase in teleworking combined with the increased care responsibilities at home during lockdowns; whereas remote working is proven to have a strong impact on the organisation of working time by increasing flexibility and workers’ constant availability9 ; whereas it is expected that the uptake of remote working and teleworking will remain higher than before the COVID-19 crisis or that it will even increase further10 ; whereas psychosocial risks are the most prevalent health risks associated with teleworking10a; __________________ 9 ‘Working anytime, anywhere: The effects on the world of work’, Eurofound and the International Labour Office, 2017, Publications Office of the European Union, Luxembourg, and the International Labour Office, Geneva. 10‘Teleworking in the aftermath of the Covid-19 pandemic: enabling conditions for a successful transition’, European Trade Union Institute, 2021, Brussels. 10aEU-OSHA Report: Telework and health risks in the context of the COVID- 19 pandemic: evidence from the field and policy implications.
Amendment 72 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital F
Recital F
F. whereas people who regularly work from home are more than twice as likely to work in excess of the requisite maximum 48 hours per week and are at risk of resting for less than the requisite 11 hours between working days; whereas almost 30 % of teleworkers report working in their free time every day or several times a week11 ; whereas except of these risks, high prevalence of teleworking also resulted in higher prevalence of musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) and rheumatic/inflammatory diseases in connection to sedentarism, poor ergonomic conditions, working long hours and work-related stress; __________________ 11‘Telework and ICT-based mobile work: Flexible working in the digital age’, New forms of employment series, Eurofound, 2020, Publications Office of the European Union, Luxembourg.
Amendment 85 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital H
Recital H
H. whereas disturbing reports regarding breaches of cross-border and seasonal workers’ rights in terms of working and living conditions have surfaced during the pandemic; whereas many of these workers were deprived of meeting with their families due to the inflexible social security rules in the EU that prevent workers to work from home in the Member State other than the Member State of the employer;
Amendment 87 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital H a (new)
Recital H a (new)
Ha. whereas prevention, awareness raising, well-being activities and promotion of health and safety culture at work can provide positive outcomes at improving the health of employees as well as provide new employment or volunteering opportunities;
Amendment 104 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1
Paragraph 1
1. Welcomes the Commission’s strategic framework and, in particular, the introduction of the Vision Zero approach to work-related accidents and diseases; calls on the Commission to expand the Vision Zero approach to other injuries and accidents, as well as physical and mental attrition; calls on the Commission to significantly increase the focus on prevention strategies; calls on the Commission and the Member States to provide support to employers that voluntarily conduct prevention activities at the workplace; calls for the ambitious implementation of the 7-year plan, also in the light of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, and believes that strong legislative action is needed on several aspects of EU policy on occupational health and safety in order to complement the variety of soft measures envisaged in order to make Vision Zero a reality; calls for a clear focus on workers’ participation in the Vision Zero approach;
Amendment 111 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 a (new)
Paragraph 1 a (new)
1a. Highlights the need to address new challenges related to the ageing of the workforce, higher prevalence of employees with chronic diseases and the need to adapt the workplace to the employees with disabilities; stresses the importance of developing policies including flexible work schedules to help employees who wish to return to work after a long disease to reintegrate at the labour market, especially in the context of cancer survivors or people with chronic diseases including MSDs and rheumatic /chronic inflammatory diseases;
Amendment 148 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 4
Paragraph 4
4. Believes that Council Directive 89/391/EEC on the introduction of measures to encourage improvements in the safety and health of workers at work has not proven effective enough for the assessment and management of psychosocial risks; recalls its request that the Commission include in the Strategic Framework for Occupational Safety and Health the right to disconnect and, explicitly, that it develop new psychosocial measures as part of the framework; calls on the Commission, in this regard, to step up the ambition of the Strategic Framework for Occupational Safety and Health; calls on the Commission to propose a directive onnew measures to address psychosocial risks and promote well-being at work aimed atwith the aim of the efficient prevention in the workplace of, inter alia, anxiety, depression, burnout and stress; calls on the Commission to recognize the link between psychosocial risks and stress at work and the flare-ups of rheumatic / chronic inflammatory diseases and develop targeted policies and preventive measures; calls on the Commission to aim for the recognition of anxiety, depression and burnout as occupational diseases, to establish mechanisms for their prevention and the reintegration into the workplace of affected employees, and to shift from individual- level actions to a work organisation approach;
Amendment 170 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 6
Paragraph 6
6. Welcomes the Commission’s intention to present by the end of 2021 a legislative initiative ton initiative to clarify the status of platform workers and improve their working conditions of platform workersand social protection; calls on the Commission to ensure that the proposal guarantees rights for all platform workers for a healthy and safe working environment for all platform workers; highlights the need to include all platform workers including those working cross- borders; reiterates the importance of flexible and future-proof proposals that can easily react to the changes in the labour market and digital progress including the strong emphasis on the ethical dimension of the digital tools and algorithms used in the work management of the platform work;
Amendment 190 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 8
Paragraph 8
8. Calls on the Commission to include health and safety in all EU strategies and policies on the green and digital transitions, including on human-centric artificial intelligence (AI);
Amendment 221 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 10
Paragraph 10
10. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to improve research and data collection and to conduct a detailed assessment of problems with health and safety associated with teleworking including research and quality data collection on the causes and impacts of musculoskeletal disorders and chronic inflammatory diseases;
Amendment 226 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 10 a (new)
Paragraph 10 a (new)
10a. Calls on the European Commission to conduct an additional research on the economic costs of health and workplace exclusion;
Amendment 229 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 11
Paragraph 11
11. Calls on the Commission to propose a legislative framework with a view to establishing minimum requirements for remote work across the Union; stresses that such a framework should clarify working conditions, including the provision, use and liability of equipment, including as regards existing and new digital tools, and that it should ensure that such work is carried out on a voluntary basis and that the rights, workload and performance standards of teleworkers are equivalent to those of comparable workers; reiterates the need to include the measures on the privacy protection of the workers with regards to the use of digital tools and AI as well as the use of AI in line with the human- centric ethical approach;
Amendment 244 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 12
Paragraph 12
12. Calls on the Commission to propose a directivensure that workers are oin mlinimum standards and conditions to ensure that workers are able to exercise effectively their right to disconnect and to regulate the use of existing and new digital tools for work purposese with the European Social Partners Framework Agreements on Telework (2002) and Digitalisation (2020) able to exercise effectively their right to disconnect;
Amendment 254 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 13
Paragraph 13
13. Welcomes the Commission’s commitment to revise Directive 90/270/EEC laying down minimum safety and health requirements for work with display screen equipment; calls on the Commission to be more ambitious in this regard and to propose a directive onbroader and more comprehensive directive on the prevention and management of work- related musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs); and rheumatic / chronic inflammatory diseases;