Home office: Many EU officials commute to Brussels

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Despite the current lockdown in large parts of Europe, according to research by WELT AM SONNTAG, an estimated hundreds of employees from EU institutions still fly through Europe every week to work from home on site.

In Brussels, where the majority of EU employees work, employees are obliged to only work from home if possible.

However, the personal statutes of the EU institutions stipulate that home office work must also take place at the place of employment.

Weekend commuters among EU employees whose families or partners do not live at their place of work but in their country of origin are therefore forced to commute back to Brussels, Luxembourg or another place of work after every weekend.

There they work in their apartments.

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“Mobile work from outside the workplace is prohibited in principle,” confirms a spokeswoman for the EU commission WELT am SONNTAG.

“This also applies to the place of origin.” Corresponding rules also apply to the European Parliament and other institutions.

Up to 2350 employees are affected

According to the EU budget, around 47,000 people work for the main EU institutions.

The vast majority of these EU employees have their center of life at the place of employment;

From the staff of the European Parliament, however, it is said that up to five percent of the employees of the EU institutions commute home on weekends.

Extrapolated, around 2350 EU employees are currently forced to stay at the place of work and not see their partners or families for weeks or to travel home and back to the place of work at the weekend despite the associated risk of infection.

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There is already criticism of this situation from the German Bundestag.

"In order to prevent the further spread of the coronavirus, the rule that full-time EU employees have to commute to Brussels to work from home should be overturned as quickly as possible," demands Gerald Ullrich.

The FDP politician is chairman of the Bundestag's EU committee.

The General Secretariat of the Council of the European Union has already reacted and temporarily suspended the relevant rule: the approximately 3,100 employees of the body that coordinates cooperation between the member states are also allowed to work from abroad from abroad until the end of January.

This text is from WELT AM SONNTAG.

We will be happy to deliver them to your home on a regular basis.

Source: WELT AM SONNTAG