Content
Prior to the European Work-related Stress Agreement being concluded in 2004, the topic of work-related stress was comprehensively covered in the Belgian private sector by a 1999 NLC Agreement on work-related stress. Indeed, the 1999 NLC Agreement on work-related stress partly acted as the inspiration for the 2004 European Agreement. All inter-sectoral interviewees reported that the Belgian Agreement set high standards for the regulation of the condition of work-related stress within the Belgian private sector. Further it was stated that the Agreement was innovative in that it defined work-related stress as a collective, rather than an
individual, condition. An FEB/VBO official detailed the process that firms complying with the 1999 Agreement went through,
‘Typically, companies go through their communications processes first, and try and identify whether stress in the company is due to a lack of clear information and communication. Then, a risk analysis is conducted, to attempt to identify within the company what factors can potentially cause stress. Then, an evaluation process is conducted in the company to assess what the company has done to tackle stress.’
(FEB/VBO)
In Belgium, there was also the 1996 Welfare at Work Act. This covered the Belgian public and private sectors, and imparted the obligation upon employers to formulate yearly plans for health and safety conditions within their enterprises. The definition of health and safety used by the act included ‘psycho-social aggression’, and this potentially included the condition of work-related stress. A range of other work was also conducted on the topic of work-related stress by the Belgian social partners prior to the European Agreement. An FGTB official stated that his organization had
engaged in a great deal of work on the organization of work in workplaces and work- related stress, and had also trained union representatives in ways to deal with the phenomenon of work-related stress.
At the Belgian sectoral level, various policies were also in place on work-related stress prior to the European Agreement. Within the banking sector, the NLC Agreement of 1999 had inspired the sectoral social partners to produce a major sectoral questionnaire on work-related stress in 2000 that had cost one million Euros and had sought to identify the scale of work-related stress within the sector. A
representative from BVB/ABB stated that policies on work-related stress differed in firms within the sector, and depended upon what steps individual banks had deemed it appropriate to take. A representative from Setca was skeptical about the quality of the measures taken by individual firms within the sector to manage work-related stress,
‘Companies are willing to acknowledge the existence of stress but not the fact that it is down to them! They won’t own up to the problem of stress. In our view, the general problem is that there is too much work in the various firms for the employees.’
(Setca)
Within the Belgian local Government sector, there was no general sectoral collective agreement on work-related stress and policy on work-related stress was generally determined at the level of individual boroughs. However, the 1996 Welfare at Work Act, described above, was applicable in the Belgian local Government sector. A representative from the local Government sector branch of FGTB stated that, owing to the lack of a public sector-level agreement on work-related stress and the very de- centralized nature of employment regulation in the Belgian local Government sector, approaches to the topic of work-related stress differed at the level of the borough. It was also added that the quality of regulation on work-related stress was likely to be contingent upon the quality of social dialogue within individual boroughs.
Data and perspectives on impact
Owing to the fact that the European Agreement was not formally transposed within the Belgian private sector at all, the impact of the implemented European Agreement within the Belgian private sector cannot be discussed directly. However, the
promotional activities that were organized by the Belgian Social partners to raise awareness of the topic of work-related stress had varying levels of impact within Belgium. An Unizo official was optimistic that the activities had achieved an impact, and stated that awareness of work-related stress in Belgium had been raised as a result. Crucially, the awareness raising activities also helped inspire a royal decree on work-related stress that was applicable to employees in the federal level Belgian public sector. However, an FGTB official in the local Government sector stated that he thought that the awareness raising activities carried out by the Belgian private sector social partners had achieved no impact within the sector. The official stated,
‘Nothing has been done as a result of the EU Agreement and its promotion in our sector. The reason for this is that if you get a “soft” law you get a “soft” reaction.’
(FGTB)
Summary
In summary, the Telework and Work-related Stress Agreements achieved a level of substantive impact within Belgium that was consistent with the procedural
existed on the topics in Belgium prior to the conclusion of the European Agreements. Very little regulation existed on teleworking prior to the European Agreement, and the European Agreement was implemented within Belgium as a legally binding collective agreement. Subsequently, the Telework Agreement had a key influence upon the content of Belgian employment regulation. By way of contrast,
comprehensive regulation existed on work-related stress prior to the conclusion of the European Agreement, and the European Agreement was not formally
implemented in Belgium. Thus, the European Work-related Stress Agreement
exercised little influence on the content of Belgian employment regulation. However, the promotional activities the European Agreement inspired appear to have had some level of impact, not least in inspiring a royal decree on work-related stress in the Belgian federal-level public sector.