Meeting of the European Works Council of DB AG

Since the last EWC meeting in autumn 2009, the financial situation of the DB Group has developed very positively. Nevertheless, the EWC members consistently reported that the employees in their countries were highly dissatisfied. No new employees have been recruited to make up for the personnel cutbacks since the onset of the economic crisis, despite a sharp increase in the number of orders. This has led to enormous pressure at work and consequently a deterioration in quality. Outsourcing, subcontracting and temporary manpower hire are increasingly being used to replace regular employees. The EWC resolved to include this item on the agenda of the next meeting. 

The key topics presented by the employer representatives at the Information and Consultation Session by Central Management dealt primarily with the positive development of the financial situation of the DB Group, the purchase of the British regional transport company ARRIVA with a workforce of more than 40,000 and branches in 10 European countries, the economic and personnel situation at DB Schenker Rail and DB Schenker Logistics, as well as the structure and remit of the newly established Board Division Compliance, Data Protection and Legal Affairs.

The EWC asked the Central Management about the current status regarding a Europe-wide internal Group labour market. The management initially intends to set up Group-wide employment markets on a national scale, which will then gradually be expanded to European level. 

The chairman of the employee representatives group and the secretary of the European Works Council of ARRIVA attended the meeting as guests.

In view of the change in employee structure at the DB Group, the EWC resolved to enter into negotiations with the Central Management in order to have the distribution of mandates and a better work structure for the EWC specified in a new agreement.

The EWC also resolved that the new agreement with the Central Management should stipulate that the ARRIVA EWC will continue to exist until a new agreement on the distribution of mandates enters into force. It was agreed that representatives of the EWC committee at DB AG would attend the next meeting of the ARRIVA EWC.

A further topic at the EWC meeting was the closing conference of the EU project "Demographic trends in the railway sector", in which the EWC was a project partner. Delegates who had attended the conference reported about various best-practice examples (cf. also www.eva-akademie.de).

The European Works Council of Deutsche Bahn AG currently has 30 members from 19 countries.

The next meeting of the EWC will be held in Berlin from May 3 – 5, 2011.