Climate, energy and industry @etuc_ces
Bruxelles / Baile Átha Cliath
Joined October 2019
- Tweets237
- Following1.6K
- Followers642
- Likes15.1K
Pinned Tweet
I wrote this for Jacobin:
'When you ask workers to develop a policy response to the issues facing their industry, they come up with very different solutions to what has so far been offered by the UK government or the companies involved'
jacobinmag.com/2020/10/oil-g…
Ben Lennon retweeted
Europe’s largest companies are seeing record profits but low investment.
What do they do with the profits instead? Distribute them to shareholders, borrow to fund more payouts, and hoard earnings to maintain buffers for future distributions.
New policy brief, co-authored with @SamuelFleischm2, @AnnaHopeEmerson, and @LaraMerling, where we look at the social costs of misdirected capital and what to do about it. Link in replies.
The EU is trying to respond to the industrial crisis but the draft proposal needs drastic improvement.
ETUC has launched a call for a study to provide the evidence needed to strengthen the negotiations.
Please share
etuc.org/en/call-tender-stud…
Ben Lennon retweeted
📹Tune in LIVE to the policy conference “A clean, just and #Competitive European industry”!
🔴webstreaming.cor.europa.eu/e…
Since the release of the #Draghi report one year ago, competitiveness has become the main theme of the European Commission. However, the definition of Competitiveness remains fuzzy and the narrative around it problematic.
The conference will discuss the goals of the European #Industrial policy and explore the necessary combination of the clean, just and competitive dimensions.
🤝Organised by FEPS and FES Just Climate and Social Justice, @FES_Europa, in collaboration with the @TheProgressives, @PES_CoR, @etuc_ces, @industriAll_EU & @Solidar_EU
Ben Lennon retweeted
Des centaines de licenciements, la fin programmée de l’acier en France et en Europe mais Mittal achète un club de basket à 1 milliard de dollars.
ArcelorMittal se fout des travailleurs et Macron, en laissant faire, se fout de nous.
Une seule solution : la NATIONALISATION !
Ben Lennon retweeted
Great to speak with @ETUC_CES and @EU_EESC today about the critical role of workers & trade unions in shaping just green industrial strategies.
One way of ensuring that workers benefit from these strategies is through conditionalities. Read my working paper with @rodrikdani to learn more ➡️ ucl.ac.uk/bartlett/public-pu…
From auto, to batteries to heat pumps, the supposed green jobs of the future are failing to deliver.
Join unions, MEPs and researchers on Tuesday to discuss how a Just Transition Directive can make the Clean Industrial Deal actually work for workers.
justclimate.fes.de/e/public-…
Ben Lennon retweeted
Spain: 60,000 people who work for delivery platform Glovo reclassified as workers thanks to strong government legislation.
That means respect of their workers rights to sick leave, holiday pay & collective bargaining.
If it can be done in Spain, it can be done throughout 🇪🇺
"The framework would have been legally binding and the first continent-wide deal between workers and fossil fuel companies focused on the decarbonisation of the energy system"
Leaving the transition to the goodwill of fossil fuel execs is a terrible idea
ft.com/content/98e2007a-c0a3…
Ben Lennon retweeted
Spent most of last week hearing from autoworkers in the U.S. & EU about their frustrations with Stellantis and the transition to EVs: it's not about climate rules or Chinese "over-capacty" but that CEOs have dropped the ball and governments have let them newrepublic.com/article/1874…
Ben Lennon retweeted
Thousands of auto workers in EU at risk of losing their jobs. The reason? Decades of poor management slowing down shift to EV's and capitalising on profits from fossil cars. Shareholder profits are put ahead of innovation.
Public procurement makes up 14% of EU GDP, yet in 55% of cases, contracts are awarded to the lowest bidder.
This leads to public money going from the pockets of workers to some of the richest companies while encouraging a race to the bottom and worsening labour conditions.
BREAKING🇪🇺: In an open letter released today, more than 100 world-leading economists, including @IsabellaMWeber, @PikettyWIL and @AnnPettifor, support essential workers’ call for EU public procurement rules which improve pay and conditions.
uni-europa.org/news/we-suppo…
"the remedies put in place by the EU to deal with the social consequences of climate action are too narrow and fragmented and contain almost no legal obligations to promote a socially ‘just transition’ that ‘leaves no-one behind’—the leitmotif of the EU Green Deal"
In our new YEL piece, @sanjabogojevic and I discuss the limitations of the current #EuropeanGreenDeal #JustTransition framework, drawing on examples from Bulgaria and Serbia, and propose how it can be improved through additional legal safeguards.
📜👉academic.oup.com/yel/article…
A just transition in the most polluting sectors is possible with strong unions and long-term planning.
The EU can ensure all high-carbon workers can benefit by passing a just transition directive based on anticipating change before it is too late.
40% of IRA delayed (ft.com)
The neo-industrial turn is good news only to the extent that it gives new impetus to old concerns:
Who decides where the money goes?
What are its objectives?
How is it used and misused?
- Cédric Durand (newleftreview.org)
Ben Lennon retweeted
"Solar panels. Heat Pumps. Electric buses."
Just three of the demands Chicago Teachers Union @CTULocal1 is making for its next contract, because kids can't learn on a boiling planet.
This is visionary bargaining for the common good. grist.org/accountability/chi…
Instead of learning why Chinese EVs are better, the EU imposes sanctions.
BYD’s $14k car goes 2,000km on one charge.
6% of EU jobs rely on the auto industry, many using Chinese parts now open to retaliation.
Workers need a real Industrial Deal now.
on.ft.com/4elDigk
Ben Lennon retweeted
The Just Transition isn't happening fairly across Europe. Workers in Central & Eastern Europe need to be empowered to ensure action lives up to rhetoric.
📨 Letter by 22 union leaders from Central & Eastern Europe to Env + Labour Ministers on need for #JustTransition Directive.
Ben Lennon retweeted
As @etuc_ces set out - our industries are already in transition but workers are being denied the tools to anticipate & manage the changes underway #JustTransition
At @industriAll_EU we want rights, up/reskilling, job to job transitions & an active industrial policy @KhattabiZakia
