White paper EC disappointing
Dear all,
16 July 2002, Please see below information on the European
Commission' white paper on corporate social responsibility.
The outcome has been very dissappointing: the EC does not even
support mandatory reporting, but instead supports a 'Multi-stakeholder
forum on CSR', which will discuss CSR on a voluntary base. However,
final recommendations will not be until 2004, so that gives
us possiblity to influence the process....
NEWS ALERT: brought to you by Ethical Performance in association
with EQ Management
European white paper steers clear of regulation
The European Commission has firmly rejected a regulatory approach
to corporate social responsibility (CSR) in its newly published
white paper on the subject.
The eagerly-awaited document, which emphasises the 'voluntary
nature of CSR', makes it clear that the EC does not at present
intend to impose responsible behaviour on companies by regulation
or directive. It rejects mandatory social and environmental
reporting, says the EC will not introduce compulsory social
labelling of products, and does not propose a Europe-wide regulation
requiring pension funds in member states to disclose any socially
responsible investment policies they may have.
Instead the emphasis is on the Commission's role in helping
to increase knowledge of the business case for CSR, to develop
means of sharing best practice, to promote CSR management skills,
and to introduce an ethical dimension to its own procurement
policies. Its chosen tool for doing all this will be a 'Multi-stakeholder
forum on CSR', comprising some 40 representatives from businesses,
trade unions, consumer groups and non-governmental organizations.
The forum will:
The EC will review the forum's progress in 2004.
On reporting, the white paper repeats an earlier EC invitation
to companies to include social and environmental information in
their annual reports, but says no more. And while it says it would
like to see pension and retail investment funds disclose whether
and how they take account of social, environmental and ethical
factors in their investment decisions, it will not introduce a
regulation to that effect. Similarly, it supports participation
in labelling schemes, but says these 'should be voluntary'.
