Working Paper & Studies

: The Independence of the ECB- Endangered by collective bargaining?

Labour law establishes universal values. Even though the scope of certain labour law provisions varies across the world of work, there can be no gaps in the coverage of labour law itself. Nevertheless, gaps in coverage arise time and again - some are well-known, whilst others one would not expect to find there upon first glance. The latter certainly applies to supranational institutions. They stand for the establishment of transnational legal principles. One rightly expects that these rights will, of course, also be upheld by the institutions themselves.

However, this does not appear to be sufficiently the case regarding minimum labour standards, such as freedom of association, employee participation, social security, and also effective access to the courts, which must be guaranteed under the rule of law. The legal framework applicable to supranational organisations, its interpretation by the courts and its application by the organisations themselves contain gaps that are difficult to accept. Prof. Dr Marlene Schmidt, professor at Goethe University Frankfurt am Main and partner at the law firm Apitzsch/Schmidt, and Dr Jannick Borchert, who contributed to the study whilst working as a trainee lawyer at Apitzsch/Schmidt, examine a legal issue that has scarcely been addressed in legal scholarship to date. It is to the authors` great credit that they have highlighted these shortcomings and thus brought them up for discussion.