10/10/2011 Social Affairs, Health and Sustainable Development
Strasbourg, 07.10.2011 – The Council of Europe’s Revised Social Charter – which allows trade unions and NGOs to bring collective complaints against states over social rights – needs to be stronger, more widely applied and better known, a parliamentary hearing on the charter heard this week.
The hearing was organised by PACE’s Sub-committee on the European Social Charter and Employment to mark the 50th anniversary of the 1961 Charter, and chaired by the head of PACE's Social, Health and Family Affairs Committee Liliane Maury-Pasquier (Switzerland, SOC).
Only 14 of the Council of Europe’s 47 member states allow “collective complaints” under the charter, pointed out Oliver Lewis, the head of the Mental Disability Advocacy Centre, which has successfully changed national laws using the mechanism: “This is hardly a ringing endorsement by European governments of allowing citizens to bring complaints about their economic, social and cultural rights.”
Luis Jimena Quesada, who heads the European Committee of Social Rights, highlighted the role of national parliaments, and of PACE itself, in helping to ensure compliance with the Charter at national level.
Other speakers included Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights Thomas Hammarberg and the President of the European Roma and Travellers’ Forum Rudko Kawczynski.