§ Mr. Evennettasked the Paymaster General if he will make a statement on the European Community Labour and Social Affairs Council held in Brussels on 5 December.
§ Mr. Kenneth ClarkeI and my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education and Science represented the United Kingdom. The Council agreed the noise directive and two European social fund matters, and agreement in principle was reached on the COMETT programme.
I welcome the agreement on a directive which will oblige member states to implement common basic requirements to protect workers from noise liable to damage their hearing. The provisions of the directive will improve the level of protection of workers against hearing loss without imposing unnecessary burdens on business. They are therefore fully acceptable to the Government, and the Health and Safety Commission will now be working to conclude the work of producing regulations in line with the directive.
The COMETT programme has been settled in principle on terms wholly acceptable to the United Kingdom. We welcome the intention of establishing this programme of co-operation between higher education and industry in the field of advanced training.
The Council agreed, subject to the opinion of the European Parliament, on amendments to the social fund rules relating to super-priority regions to take account of the accession of Spain and Portugal. Agreement was also reached that schemes encouraging self-employment should be eligible for fund support from 1986 onwards. The Government measure which should benefit in 189W particular from this agreement on encouraging self-employment is the enterprise allowance scheme, which is proving extremely effective in immediate job creation. I am satisfied that the agreements we reached on the social fund will provide a worthwhile level of support for measures to improve employment prospects.
The Council also discussed the Commission's memorandum on youth policies and the draft parental leave directive. On the parental leave directive, a number of member states expressed reservations and the President concluded that it was not possible for the Council to reach agreement. I maintained the Government's objection in principle which was endorsed by the House on 26 November. I proposed that this directive might in due course be considered by the new unit of the Commission which will appraise the impact of new regulations on small and modern size businesses. This proposal will no doubt be considered when the new unit is established and if a forthcoming Presidency wishes to resume discussion of the proposal in the Council of Ministers.