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The European Commission has adopted a proposal for a Council Decision on the revised guidelines for spending funds on coal & steel research. The Research Fund for Coal and Steel (RFCS) has an annual budget of about €60 million for research in these two areas, financed by interest on the assets of the now expired European Coal and Steel Community Treaty.

The European Commission welcomes the adoption by the European Parliament of the proposal to phase out the use of toxic mercury in measuring devices, where it can be substituted by safer alternatives, in order to protect health and environment.

Monster Worldwide and Monster Europe unveiled the extended Monster Employment Index Europe, a monthly analysis of online hiring activity across the European Union designed to provide a clearer understanding of worker demand in key markets across the region. The Index provides analyses across and within countries in the European Community, as well as showing changes in demand for occupational categories and industry sectors.

Across Europe, rapid broadband penetration and, more importantly, increasingly bandwidth-hungry applications and services are being deployed and consumed. This is creating a need for service providers to focus on their access network strategies.

Rising waste volumes and growing legislative pressure have necessitated steady investments in the European industrial waste management industry. Opportunities are diverse, owing to the varied stages of market development across Europe, with Southern Europe and the United Kingdom offering good growth prospects. At the same time, the market is likely to experience a shift towards technologically advanced treatment solutions.

The European Commission published the 2006 annual report on the protection of the Communities’ financial interests and the fight against fraud. This is an area in which responsibility is shared between the Commission and the Member States. The report sets out the most significant measures taken in 2006 by the Member States and the Commission to improve prevention and fight against fraud. A statistical evaluation of all irregularities communicated to the Commission by Member States shows that the total number of irregularities increased for agriculture, cohesion and pre-accession funds, and decreased for own resources and structural funds. In spite of well over 12.000 irregularities notified, further progress in speed and quality of transmission remains an objective.

The average wages of European workers increased significantly between 2005 and 2006, according to the annual report on pay developments from Eurofound’s European Industrial Relations Observatory (EIRO).

Plans to open up postal services to competition across the EU by 2011 will be debated on 9 July, and put to a plenary vote on 10 July, in Strasbourg. MEPs may well endorse 31 December 2010 as the deadline for eliminating any remaining postal service monopolies. This deadline - a compromise agreed in the Transport Committee to give operators and regulators more time to adjust - is two years later than the European Commission had proposed (1 January 2009).

Four out of five workers in France are satisfied or very satisfied with their working conditions, results from the fourth European Working Conditions Survey reveal.

Average European wages increased significantly between 2005 and 2006, Eurofound’s European Industrial Relations Observatory (EIRO) reveals in its annual update of pay trends, Pay developments – 2006. However, considerable differences remain between the former EU15 and the 12 new Member States, both in terms of trends and the level of pay increases.