Transferring Visteon’s EWC to operate under British law has been one of the American global automotive electronics supplier’s longstanding goals (c.f. article No. 120351). Significant changes in the company’s legal structure (in 2014 it bought US Johnson Controls electronics division and in 2015 it sold its equity interest in the Climate operations that had its own EWC) gave management the opportunity to justify a comprehensive renegotiation with a specially established SNB of a new EWC agreement that would operate under British law. The agreement was signed on 24 May, just one month before the UK voted to exit the EU…
The new agreement comes under EU Directive 2009/38 on EWCs and thus contains new elements: information, consultation, and the possibility for expressing relevant opinions within a twenty working day timeframe following meetings. Management then has a further twenty working days to respond. A select committee of five members will discuss the need to call a select committee meeting or if extraordinary circumstances require, a plenary EWC meeting. Extraordinary circumstances exclude decisions or matters affecting fewer than 75 ‘relevant’ employees in at least two different EEA Member States, within a three-month timeframe from the time the EWC is first informed of the matter. However they do include decisions leading to social plans (or in those countries where this notion is less familiar, decisions that impact a minimum of twenty employees) in at least two different EEA Member States, within a three-month timeframe from the time the EWC is first informed of the matter. An information procedure is intended when a project only affects a single country and when the project is significant, i.e. leads to a social plan.
Committee members have the right to visit sites in their own Member State other than their own site, with prior management agreement.