The PES Group in the Committee of the Regions will organise a seminar on "Promoting decent work in the EU" in Brussels on 7 October 2008, in the framework of the CoR Open Days 2008.

The workshop - chaired by PES Group President, Mercedes BRESSO - will explore the contribution of local and regional authorities to ensuring decent work and fair wages in the EU. Key aspects of this are: work organisation and contractual relations (including ‘flexicurity’), employment protection legislation, welfare systems such as childcare, education and training, and social dialogue.

The aim of this event will be to bring together PES group members of the CoR, European employers’ and employees’ organisations, and large individual employers, as well as experts from the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions, and civil society organisations (e.g. SOLIDAR).

Speakers will include Jan Cremers MEP, Member of the EP Committee for the internal market and consumer protection; Conny Reuter, Secretary-General of SOLIDAR and Rudi Delarue, Director of the Brussels Office of the International Labour Organisation.