The Information and Consultation of Employees (ICE) Directive: Employer Occupation of Regulatory Space for Informing & Consulting Workers in Liberal Market Regimes

Abstract

This working paper explores the transposing of the EU Information and Consultation of Employees (ICE) Directive in the Liberal Market Economies of the Republic of Ireland (ROI) and Northern Ireland (NI) by considering how employers and employees have responded to national information and consultation regulations. We outline the analytical concept of ‘regulatory space’ and assess the impact of ICE Regulations in both ROI and NI jurisdictions in 4 cross-border case study organizations. The research concludes that an analytical framework to advance the concept of ‘regulatory space’ enables a refined assessment of employer and employee responses to employee voice regulation. Employer occupancy of regulatory space for voice is explained in part by a reassessment of the regulatory function of the State, from one of employee to employer protection. The UK and Irish governments both closely circumscribed the parameters of the national ICE Regulations to limit encroachment on the terrain of managerial prerogative. Ambivalence of national unions towards contesting the space opened by the ICE Directive also aids employers in occupying space for voice. The case evidence suggests that, consequently, employers largely dominate regulatory trajectories for workplace voice, and patterns of regulatory space for voice varied across workplaces. Though employees and their representatives were marginalized for the most part, voice remains a contested terrain.