EPO's Local Occupational Health, Safety and Ergonomics Committee (LOHSEC) in The Hague: Workers Are Getting Sicker, Conditions in Which to Assess Patent Applications Deteriorate
"According to the Office statistics the total number of days of absence has gone up from 12.4 to 13.1 total number of sick days per Full Time Equivalent (FTE) from 2023 to 2024."
THE EPO's staff representatives in The Hague (LSCTH) have a new publication today. In order to understand the pressure put on examiners to grant illegal and invalid European Patents* we must understand the working conditions (physical and mental; the latter includes threats).
In the Benoît Battistelli days Upper Limb Disorder (ULD) had already exploded in the Office, so we can assume it's the same under António Campinos.
How have things changed? Has anything improved for real? Or just false metrics?
Here's the new report, which is only hours old.
Staff Committee The Hague
Comité du personnel de La Haye
Personalausschuss Den HaagRijswijk, 10 February 2025
sc25002hpReport on the meeting of the LOHSEC The Hague
On 18 November 2024, Staff Representation met with the administration in 73rd Local Occupational Health, Safety and Ergonomics Committee (LOHSEC) in The Hague. The meeting addressed the topics of the sickness statistics, the nature of the feedback on the ergonomic visits to workplaces, dedicated parking places for pregnant colleagues, and the presence of Automatic External Defibrillators in the New Main building.
Present members appointed by the President were F. Brunelle (Chair), F. Zacca, D. Schüder, E. Schmitz, J. de Bruin, K. Lievens, Y. Hofstede and A. Kirch.
Present members appointed by the LSCTH were I. Larrañeta Reclusa and J. Raposo.
The official minutes were taken by Anne-Cathrine Crignon and will be published subsequently here.
During the meeting which lasted from 10h30 to 11h30, the following points were brought forward by members of the Administration and H&S:
1. The LOHSEC informed the Administration about the importance of considering continuity of services and knowledge of specific Dutch healthcare issues when selecting Health and Safety personnel.
2. The Administration presented the main points discussed (agenda) in the previous meeting of the COHSEC of 13 November 2024:
2.1 OHS reported on the last sick leave statistics1. According to the Office statistics the total number of days of absence has gone up from 12.4 to 13.1 total number of sick days per Full Time Equivalent (FTE) from 2023 to 2024.
2.2 BIT explained initiatives regarding ergonomics in hardware and in software2.
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1 See also COHSEC/DOC 12/2024
2 See COHSEC/DOC 13/2024 and “Software ergonomics - important for health of staff”, 8.11.2024, CSC
2.3 OHS objectives 20253 and office wide KPIs were presented for feedback, and several members expressed a negative opinion4. Specifically, concerns were raised about the KPIs' lack of adaptation to the New Ways of Working (NWoW) and the Bringing Team Together (BTT) initiatives, which have led to predominantly computer-screen- oriented work and reduced personal interactions. Additionally, there were concerns about the lack of continuous monitoring of these KPIs, as there is no Staff Engagement Survey planned for 2025.
2.4 New wardens are set to be trained for the NWoW situation.
2.5 The Office confirmed that Staff was fully insured during the activities of the Campus Days.
The following three points were brought forward by the Staff Representation:
3. The Staff Representation noted that the statistics provided on office ergonomic visits are only quantitative and not qualitative. The Staff Representation expressed concern that in the NWoW scenario, colleagues are coming to offices for a day and may not take the time to adjust their chairs and desks properly. The administration indicated than an office wide report is being drafted on ergonomics, which is to be presented to the COHSEC in March.
4. The administration was invited to foresee dedicated parking spaces for pregnant colleagues. The administration indicated that if implemented, it should be done office wide, and that the issue would be discussed with OH to investigate whether this is a possible solution.
5. The Staff Representation advocated for Automatic External Defibrillators to be present in every floor. The Administration explained that this is not a requirement but informed that signs are foreseen to be placed on every floor by the end of 2024 to indicate the location of the nearest defibrillator.
Kind regards,
Your staff representatives[...]
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3 COHSEC/DOC 14/2024
4 COHSEC/AV 1/2024
It's worth noting that the Office does a lot of "box-ticking" exercises without actually tackling problems, instead patting itself on the back. Or, as the staff representatives put it, "only quantitative and not qualitative" statistics are relied upon.
How can the Office actually attract people who possess the skills needed to properly examine patents? How can it retain any? We heard from EPO staff that totally lost basic health (incapable of even typing anymore; it's exceedingly excruciating). The EPO is good at devastating people's lives and then plundering pensions or other rewards. The EPO would even violate its own contracts. Who's gonna hold it accountable? Nobody. █
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* Those include European software patents - i.e. patents which are both illegal and undesirable.