Country overview



Lionel Fulton, Labour Research Department

Existing board-level representation made the directive an important topic for Austria. However, there was no major debate on its transposition into national law. The possibility of also allowing domestic companies to have a one-tier board was raised but then rejected.

Austria has existing national legislation providing for employee board-level representation in a wide range of both public and private companies, giving a clear relevance to the legislation implementing the European company directive. Representatives of both employees and employers were involved in detailed discussions on transposing the directive into national law. However, there were no major disagreements during the process. One issue which was debated more widely was the possibility of extending to Austrian companies the opportunity provided to European companies of choosing between the single-tier and two-tier board. However, in the end it was decided not the take this step and to leave the requirement to have a two-tier board in place.

Special negotiating body (SNB)

Standard rules under the fallback procedure

Misuse of procedures and structural change