Country overview



There is employee board-level representation in large companies and those with substantial state involvement in Luxembourg. The issue of the European company is of interest, as Luxembourg could potentially be the base for future European companies. The proposed legislation implementing the directive produced detailed comments from both unions and employers but there was no widespread public debate.

Companies which have more than 1,000 employees, or which are more than 25% state owned, or which receive state aid for their main business must have employee representatives at board level. They generally have a third of the seats.

The introduction of the concept of the European company also provoked interest in Luxembourg, in view of its existing position as the headquarters of a number of major companies already operating across Europe. As the government stated in its background comments on the draft text presented in January 2005, “”the European Company could be an interesting instrument for attracting companies into the Luxembourg economy”.

Both unions and employers were directly consulted in June 2004 on the proposed legislation on the transposition of the directive on employee involvement in European companies. Both responded the following month and their comments were taken account of in the draft text presented in January 2005. In addition the formal consultation after the draft text had been presented involved the elected chambers representing employees and employers and both sides made comments on the text.

Despite this extensive involvement in the draft text by both unions and employers and more general representative bodies, there was no public debate. One reason for this was that, as the government’s own comments in January 2005 made clear, the directive did not “introduce any fundamentally new concepts into Luxembourg labour law, either in terms of the general approach or the techniques used”.

Special negotiating body (SNB)

Standard rules under the fallback procedure

Misuse of procedures and structural change