European Foundation
for the Improvement of
Living and Working Conditions

The tripartite EU agency providing knowledge to assist
in the development of better social, employment and
work-related policies

COVID-19 EU PolicyWatch

Database of national-level responses

Eurofound's COVID-19 EU PolicyWatch collates information on the responses of government and social partners to the crisis, as well as gathering examples of company practices aimed at mitigating the social and economic impacts.

Overview

COVID-19 EU PolicyWatch currently contains 670 measures introduced by governments and social partners to cushion the social and economic effects on businesses, workers and citizens.

Use the side navigation to find measures by country, type of measure, category, or target group.

Categories

Target groups

The database indicates for each measure to which target groups it applies, broadly differentiating between workers, businesses and citizens.

The database contains 42 specific target groups, including for example:

Recently updated measures

Agreement on the protection of employees and social measures as part of the relaunch of activity at EDF SA

As part of the continuation and relaunch of activity within the EDF energy group, __'and in particular the modalities of reprogramming until the end of 2020 the activities suspended during the health ...

France | 21 September 2020

New agreement within the Ariane-Group contains solidarity fund and other measures

Taking into account of __'the exceptional situation caused by COVID-19'__, the management of ArianeGroup concluded an agreement on 29 May 2020 aimed at __'defining the modalities of implementation of ...

France | 21 September 2020

Social partners protest against government's attempt to breach their autonomy

In the anti-crisis legislation known as the Anti-crisis Shield, the government included regulations allegedly violating the autonomy of the Social Dialogue Council and of social partners themselves. T...

Poland | 21 September 2020

Involvement of social partners in legislation

Eurofound identified 513 legislations and other statutory regulations, 297 of which have been created entirely new in the context of COVID-19. This section gives an overview of social partner's involvement in designing and implementing these measures.

Role of employers' organisations in designing the measure

  • In 295 measures, employers' organisations were involved:
  • In 132 measures, there was no involvement;
  • For the 86 remaining measures the involvement is unknown, or they were considered as being out of the social partner's domain.

Role of trade unions in designing the measure

  • In 281 measures, trade unions were involved:
  • In 136 measures, there was no involvement;
  • For the 96 remaining measures the involvement is unknown, or they were considered as being out of the social partner's domain.

Implementation, monitoring and assessment phase

  • In 64 measures, social partners were involved:
  • In the remaining 449 measures, there was no involvement or the involvement is unknown.

Collective agreements

The COVID-19 EU PolicyWatch database contains 43 collective agreements. Most of them were identified in France and the most commonly found provisions relate to employment retention, working time flexibility, and health and safety.

Contents

13 agreements additionally contain other provisions not mentioned above.

Social partner initiatives

The COVID-19 EU PolicyWatch database contains 30 social partner initiatives. Most of them were identified in Slovenia and belong to the category Protection of workers, adaptation of workplace.

Main themes

Company practices

The COVID-19 EU PolicyWatch database contains 22 company practices. Most of them were identified in Croatia and the most commonly found provisions relate to employment retention, health and safety, and bonuses.

Contents

4 company practices additionally contain other provisions not mentioned above.

    • Bonuses from supermarket chains to reward their employees.

      During the pandemic crisis, many businesses were forced or voluntarily shut down. On the contrary, the food and supermarket retailers, an industry with high rates of flexible forms of employment, not...

      Greece | 11 September 2020

      A new employment model in Höfe

      At the beginning of August 2020, discount retailer Höfer announced a new employment model. According to this model, workers, mainly employed in sales services and logistics, will be employed full time...

      Slovenia | 10 September 2020

      Extention of moratorium or deferal payment for loans by Sberbank d.d.

      Due to the adverse consequences of coronavirus crisis, many citizens found themselves in the dire situation and due to unemployment or decrease in salaries are not able to duly repay bank loans. There...

      Croatia | 04 July 2020

Disclaimer: This information has not been subject to the full Eurofound evaluation, editorial and publication process. All information is preliminary and subject to change.