Multisectoral public services and telecoms social dialogue project on the roleof social partners in preventing third-party violence & harassment at work
Action Plan for adoption on 25 November 2022, Madrid
In Spring 2020, as the COVID-19 pandemic broke out, nine EU social partners in publicservices and telecoms came together to examine the effectiveness of the Multi-Sectoral
Guidelines on prevention of third-party violence and harassment (TPVH) in response togrowing reports of violence and harassment at work.
The social partners are EPSU, ETUCE, CESI and ETF, on the trade union side, and on theemployers’, HOSPEEM, EUPAE, CEMR, UITP and ETNO, covering healthcare, central
government including prison services, local and regional government, education, urban
transport, and telecoms.
Not all have signed up to the 2010 Guidelines, namely UITP, ETF and ETNO, but their own
sectoral instruments have proven very relevant for the project discussions and assessment ofthe Guidelines.
During the years 2021 and 2022, the project was able to fund extensive research carried outby Dr. Jane Pillinger, six theme-based online webinars and an in-person conference in Madrid
attended by more than 100 delegates from 27 European countries, the European Commission,
Eurofound and EU-OSHA.
The project has deepened the cooperation between the nine social partners and theirdetermination to establishing a zero-tolerance policy toward violence and harassment at workin all its forms, which covers all workers, users, clients, visitors, contractors, and anyone else
who may come in contact with the personnel, physically or virtually. This remains afundamental starting point.
To maintain the momentum, this Action Plan is endorsed by the project partners andconference delegates who recommend its adoption by the relevant social dialoguecommittees in the first half of 2023.
Key project findings
The project research is based on a literature and data review, a survey with responses from165 project partners’ national members, six webinar discussions in total, covering genderedviolence and domestic violence, prevention and risk assessment, digitalisation, compensationand support for victims and brainstorming on updating and improving the Guidelines.
The project gave the opportunity to discuss the proposed EU Directive on violence against
women and domestic violence, which triggered a statement by some of the project partners
calling for a much stronger focus on the role of social partners in tackling and preventing
gender-based violence (see here).

Action Plan for adoption on 25 November 2022, Madrid

It also allowed to reaffirm the importance of the ILO Violence and Harassment Convention
No.190 and Recommendation No.206, adopted in 2019, thanks to a women-led transnational
campaign, which is yet to be ratified by all EU Member States (to date ratified by Spain, Italyand Greece). The instruments provide a framework, as reflected in a number of national
initiatives and collective agreements, for an integrated, gender-based and intersectional
approach to violence and harassment in the world of work, encompassing both internal andexternal violence at work.
The research provides ample evidence of the outstanding challenges for social partners andpublic authorities to prevent and better respond to external violence at work against a context
of growing income and wage inequalities, austerity measures resulting in under-resourced
public services, and a sense of not being in control of a fast-changing world of work, not least
related to digitalisation.
It finds that there is still much underreporting of violence and harassment, due to the lack of avisible, effective policy at the workplace to establish complaints systems that workers trust andto implement prevention measures, as well as a persistent perception that violence is part of
the job.
Despite underreporting, there is evidence of increasing TPVH including gender-based violence
and gender-based cyberviolence/harassment.
Yet, violence and harassment is not inevitable and the social partners can make a crucial
difference through the various legal and policy instruments at their disposal related to OSH,
gender equality, non-discrimination, labour laws/codes with provisions on harassment andcriminal law. Importantly, victims or witnesses of violence need to know that reporting will beeffectively tackled and responded to by management and public authorities. Avoiding working
alone, management support and compensation for victims/survivors of violence, working
towards better and more resources services for citizens, are also essential.
The role of labour inspectors in preventing and detecting risks of TPVH remains critical, as isaccess to recourse and justice and more actions to enhance the role of prevention.
The Multi-Sectoral Guidelines need a refresh
The Guidelines agreed 12 years ago have proven useful in raising awareness about the roleof social partners to tackle external violence, but they have not been updated since then andmay risk becoming out of date.
The project survey found that only a small number of social partners at national level know
they even exist (30%). The Guidelines have not been implemented in any multisectoral
agreement at the national level, with the exception of Denmark in two sectors.
There is, however, better knowledge and awareness of the problem from surveys andpractice/experience on the ground, and as the research has found, there are many examples
of joint or stand-alone initiatives by the trade unions and the employers via collective
bargaining, negotiation of workplace policies, security measures, awareness raising
campaigns, practical guidance, and support measures for victims of violence and harassment.
Few national collective agreements deal exclusively with external violence. It is more often
integrated in agreements on OSH and/or gender equality or on the specific issue ofcyberviolence in relation to digitalisation.

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Actions in the very short term
✓ Dissemination of the research report enclosing 40 examples of social partner initiatives
across the EU as a source of practical tools to address violence and harassment,
online and offline, via workplace policies and collective bargaining. The executive
summary will be available in 22 languages and the full report in DE, EN, ES, FR, IT,
RO (tbc).
✓ Communication tools to help national members disseminating the report and easily
access the useful, reported national initiatives will be available at the end of 2022 orearly 2023.
Actions in the short term
Despite the limited implementation of the Guidelines, taking into account the specificities of
TPVH, which became an even greater problem during the COVID-19 pandemic, there isconsensus about the relevance of retaining dedicated Guidelines on TPVH.
This means ensuring the dynamic nature of the Guidelines in order to provide examples ofactions that can be taken in a range of different agreements on OSH, wellbeing at work, genderequality, non-discrimination, labour laws/codes, as well as providing guidance on moredetailed practical implementation of agreements/policies at the workplace and sectoral levels.
To remain relevant, the Guidelines need to be updated, as detailed in therecommendations of the project’s research report, at least in the following areas:✓ Gender-based violence: The Guidelines need to better reflect national legislation andcollective agreements and ILO Convention 190 and Recommendation 206 to ensure
inclusion of gender-based violence including domestic violence, which became all themore urgent in view of the development of telework. Five countries have already
implemented laws which include paid domestic violence leave, as in Italy, Spain andIreland, and many others are including this issue in jointly negotiated workplacemeasures. The revised Guidelines can provide a useful common framework togeneralize the good practices at national level.
✓ A better understanding and focus to gender-responsive approaches to TPVH in linewith ILO Convention 190 and Recommendation 206 is also needed.
✓ Occupational health and safety remains a common entry point to discuss and tackle
the prevention of violence and harassment at work. There is a need to better enforce
OSH risk assessment, and to include psychosocial risks, such as insufficient staffing,along with better security protocols, support for and compensation of victims. In thisregard, it is important to encourage the national implementation of EUOSHA’s Online
Interactive Risks Assessment Tools (OiRA) and ensure meaningful involvement ofsectoral social partners.
✓ Digitalisation, especially if not well designed in cooperation with workers and theirtrade union representatives, can lead to frustrations from service users and a
fragmentation/dilution of responsibilities in service provision, which can in turn trigger
abuse and violence from third parties. New strategies are needed to tackle the problem
in the rapidly changing world of work both to the benefit of workers but also to thequality and availability of public and commercial services.
✓ The Guidelines should also reflect a common understanding of the various forms ofcyber-violence, which, unlike other forms of violence, is often from anonymous
perpetrators, and according to the ILO, comes more often from other
employees/colleagues/management.

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Action Plan for adoption on 25 November 2022, Madrid

There is also consensus amongst the project partners to find ways to make theGuidelines more effective at the workplace level.
✓ Consider whether and how the Guidelines, or a set of principles underpinning theGuidelines, should be binding in national collective agreements and/or EU sector
specific agreements.
✓ Once the Guidelines have been revised, they should benefit from a high-level launch
including a dedicated website, accessible materials and fact sheets and be supported
by a communication and dissemination plan to reach out to national members
In the longer term: towards an integrated approach to violence and harassment at work
It is recommended that the cross-sector social partners consider negotiating a legally bindingsocial partner agreement on all forms of violence and harassment including TPVH (updating
the 2007 social partner agreement on violence and harassment) to ensure alignment with ILO
Convention 190 and national agreements that favour an integrated approach to violence andharassment, covering a gender-responsive approach towards both internal and externalviolence and harassment.
Process and timing
The project partners commit to submitting the Action Plan for adoption with theirrespective sectoral social dialogue committees in the first half of 2023.
Should there be endorsement of the Action Plan and the research recommendations to revise
the Guidelines, funding from the Commission will be sought to finance the updating andrevision of the Guidelines in 2023.
Alternatively, each sectoral social dialogue committee can request funding for negotiating theirown sectoral agreement.

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