Putting Europe on solid ground: A worker-centred State of the Union
Letter from the European Trade Union Confederation to Commission President Ursula von der Leyen
Dear President von der Leyen,
As you prepare your 2025 State of the Union address, the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC), representing 45 million working people across Europe, urges you to put workers - their jobs, pay, and future - at the heart of your vision for Europe.
Working people are the foundation of Europe. Yet today, their future is under threat. The EU must act decisively to protect jobs, raise standards, and ensure that the major transitions ahead are shaped with workers - through collective bargaining and strong and inclusive social dialogue.
We are increasingly concerned by the absence of new legislative initiatives for working people. Despite mounting challenges including from global economic shocks and the pressures of the green and digital transitions, EU action in the social field seems to be retreating at the very moment it is most needed.
Europe cannot build lasting strength on a model of competitiveness driven by deregulation, wage suppression and precariousness, or a race to the bottom. This approach weakens social cohesion and threatens the very foundation of the European project. It is not only unjust, it is short-sighted. Europe’s social model is not a burden but our greatest competitive advantage. Undermining it, failing to invest now in our workforce, cutting back rights and public services only weakens our resilience and overall competitiveness.
Protect jobs and production in Europe
Increasing global trade tensions, coupled with the EU-US framework trade agreement and rising competition from China, put a strain on Europe’s industries and economy and expose them to serious employment risks. Europe has lost almost four million jobs in the manufacturing sector since 2000, and there have been recent announcements of major job-shedding measures in strategic industries.
We urge you to commit to:
- Crisis response measures and a ‘SURE 2.0’ mechanism to protect jobs and production in Europe from external shocks;
- Suspension of the EU fiscal rules to enable national investment in industrial and economic resilience;
- A permanent EU investment instrument with strong social conditionalities to protect vulnerable sectors and support the creation of quality jobs.
Deliver quality jobs and strengthen workers’ rights
Protecting jobs is not enough. Workers also need fair pay, secure contracts, safe workplaces, and real prospects. Yet collective bargaining coverage across the EU has fallen from 66% in 2000 to just 56% by 2019. This weakens workers’ share of productivity gains and fuels inequality.
Young workers across Europe face worsening economic insecurity. The share of 25-34-year-olds living with their parents increased in most Member States. Nearly 50% of minimum-wage earners under 35 cannot afford to live independently. This is not freedom, it is failure.
We call on you to ensure that the Quality Jobs Roadmap includes concrete legislative initiatives and investment proposals to deliver your Commission’s own commitment to quality jobs including “fair wages, good working conditions, training and fair job transitions for workers and the self-employed.”
Additionally, we urge:
- Stronger EU-level measures to promote and protect collective bargaining and to ensure pay rises and adequate minimum wages;
- Urgent action to tackle work-related stress, subcontracting and labour intermediaries abuses, precarious working conditions, and violations of the right to disconnect;
- Tougher enforcement to end extreme exploitation, including wage theft, gangmaster abuse, and undeclared work, particularly in agriculture, construction, and logistics, and initiatives to ensure fair mobility;
- Support for meaningful and structured social dialogue at both national and EU levels as a pillar of democratic decision-making and effective economic governance;
- Reinforcing democracy at work in the first place by strengthening collective bargaining, introducing a comprehensive EU framework on information,
consultation and participation, and fully safeguarding well-functioning collective bargaining systems.
Ensure just transitions
The transition to a green and digital economy must not leave workers behind. Too often, change is imposed from above, without participation or protection.
We call on the Commission to:
- Propose a Just Transition Directive, guaranteeing training rights, early anticipation of change managed through collective bargaining and social dialogue;
- Introduce a Directive on AI at Work to enforce the human-in-control principle and protect against algorithmic surveillance, deskilling, and exploitation. AI should empower workers - not replace, monitor, or undermine them. Europe must lead by example and put guardrails in place before it’s too late.
Use public money for the public good
We urge you to:
Increase investment in workers in every occupation and throughout their life;
Introduce social conditionalities across all EU funding and state aid to create quality jobs and promote collective bargaining;
Ensure that the revision of Public Procurement Directives guarantees that public money goes to organisations that respect workers’ and trade union rights, that negotiate with trade unions and whose workers are covered by collective agreements.
Reject deregulation and attacks against labour rights
The EU must not return to failed models. The proposed 28th Company Regime must not touch labour law. Any attempt to sidestep national protections or collective agreements is unacceptable and would lead to social dumping and undermine workers’ protection, the EU social acquis Communautaire, national labour law and collective agreements.
We ask you to:
- Publicly confirm that labour law will be excluded from the 28th Company Regime;
- Reaffirm the full respect for the autonomy of social partners, the right to collective bargaining and national labour systems.
Rebuilding on a strong foundation
President von der Leyen, workers have carried Europe through crisis after crisis. Now they deserve more than thanks - they deserve action. They must no longer be treated as a cost to be managed in the name of competitiveness, nor left behind in a race to the bottom on wages and protections.
The EU must reject deregulation and rollbacks. It must resist internal and external pressures to weaken hard-won rights, including on equality.
The EU must not allow itself to be bullied - whether by internal forces or international partners like the United States - into rolling back social and equality standards in trade or regulatory negotiations. Our rights are not bargaining chips.
The EU must stop recommending austerity approaches that target workers’ rights and incomes and public services instead of demanding fairer taxation on extreme wealth and corporations. Sustainable social progress requires a just fiscal approach, not more cuts to those who build Europe.
Instead, Europe must set a global standard for fairness, respect, social dialogue and democracy at work.
By placing workers at the heart of your 2025 address with legislative initiatives and investments for quality jobs, you can send a clear message: Europe is not just a market - it is a shared project built by and for its people.
The EU has the capacity and the responsibility to ensure that all jobs in Europe are quality jobs - offering fair pay, security, and respect - and to create opportunities for all workers across every region and sector.
The ETUC stands ready to work with you to build Europe on a solid foundation - one that recognises working people not as a burden, but as Europe’s greatest asset.
Yours sincerely,
Esther Lynch,
General Secretary of the European Trade Union Confederation