Staff Regulations of EC officials: amending the Regulations

The European Parliament made several amendments to the Commission's proposals on Staff Regulations. (Please refer to the document dated 18/03/03). The rapporteurs were Malcolm HARBOUR (EPP-ED, UK) and Manuel MEDINA ORTEGA (PES, Spain). Parliament decided to postpone the final vote and refer the proposals back to committee to enable further discussions to take place. Apart from pensions and the creation of a special category for linguists, Parliament also considered the following: - the European Communities Personnel Selection Office may be called upon to organise internal competitions as well as selection procedures for political group staff; - decisions relating to appointments, promotions, grading, transfers or disciplinary measures for officials of one institutions will not be entrusted to another institution or to an inter-institutional body; - the entry standards are raised for categories AST, AD and ADL, with Parliament insisting on formal educational qualifications and deleting the alternative of equivalent professional experience; - as well as prohibiting sexual and psychological harassment, Parliament has inserted "harassment based on gender" as a proscribed class of conduct. It made clear that a person's rejection of, or submission to, sexual harassment or harassment based on gender cannot be used as a basis for a decision affecting that person; - the institutions may compensate for loss suffered by an official who has been the subject of wilful false accusations; - political group staff may be appointed as officials, if they have passed a selection procedure and have been in service as temporary agents for more than seven years; - the institutions should recognise non-marital partnerships. This is defined as one where the couple produces a formal document or registration of a Member State attesting to their partnership. In the absence of such document, they must establish to the satisfaction of the employing institution that they have formed a household for at least two years; - certain aspects of the Staff Regulations are extended to cover parliamentary assistants. They will be paid from the section of the budget for the European Parliament; - within the institutions, contractual agents will eventually replace civil servants in category D. In the representation offices, Commission delegations, agencies, executive agencies and other bodies, contractual agencies may be recruited at all levels up to two-thirds of employees and with the exception of executive positions.�