Skepticism on ownership unbundling at EPSU Energy Conference: think twice before you act.
This was echoed forcefully by Gert de Block of CEDEC and representing the local power companies. He detailed how the Commission shifted its position from addressing market concentration to making ownership unbundling of Transmission and distribution networks the key. Ownership unbundling of DSOs would lead to further concentration and privatisation. Prof. Steve Thomas of the University of Greenwich challenged the argumentation of the Commission for ownership unbundling especially since competition on wholesale markets is limited. He called proposals to have ownership unbundling of small distribution companies economic vandalism.
Representatives of the industry and EPSU social partners Eurogas and Eurelectric also voiced skepticism on the proposals. The Eurelectric representative also introduced the Role of Electricity project of Eurelectric which is based on a scenario to demonstrates how emission reduction targets and renewable targets can be met at a lower costs then current policies. Representatives of RWE, Alwin Fitting and EDF, Bernard Caron introduced the positions of their companies. Both companies are opposed to ownership unbundling. Mr. Fitting outlined the future strategy and investments of the company including in clean coal technology and a carbon free coal fired powerplant. The representative of EDF further presented the EDF human resource policy and the role of the European Works Council. The company is also positive about the agreement it negotiated with the trade unions (and including PSI, EPSU’s global sister federation) on Corporate Social Responsibility. The
German European Parliament Member Herbert Reul (European Christen democrats) expressed his concern over the Commission’s proposals’ on ownership unbundling. "Why break up well functioning companies ? I do not see that ownership unbundling will lead to more investment for example in cross border interconnections". He also voiced concern that the Commission would intervene in the national energy mix. He underlined the need for a consistent European energy policy which is not decided in the spur of the moment and which keeps several options open. Joel Decaillon of ETUC stressed the importance of addressing climate change and taking the social aspects of the (transition) measures into account. The general interest and ensuring a right of access to energy for all, are important issues for ETUC.
The second day focused on the implications of the European energy policy for the European works councils and the trade unions. Steve Thomas presented a paper on the concentration in the sector and corporate strategies. Pascal Riandey of Secafi, a French union consultancy and Jean-Jacques Paris detailed the case of the merger Suez-GdF from the perspective of Suez and the EWC. The secretaries of the RWE EWC Uwe Tigges and the Gaz de France EWC Martine Feuillerat gave examples of what EWCs can do to improve the position of the EWC. The EWC of RWE has negotiated an agreement on restructuring and the EWC of GdF took the company to court for violation of the information and consultation rights (and won !).
Several panels provided further insight in the work of the EWCs with cases of Vattenfall, EDF, CEZ and ENEL being presented on the first day and the situation from the perspective of unions in the New Member States on the second day (ENEL, Romania; EDF, Poland; EVN, Macedonia and Eon, Bulgaria). The final panel concluded that more work is needed on:
The role of EWCs in Outsourcing
Energy and Public Service (addressing fuel poverty, democratic control)
Continuation of a critical view on the internal market and ownership unbundling.
The contributions of the different speakers are available here.
The conference was organised by EPSU and SDA and received the financial support of the European Commission.
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