Albania has breached several critical articles of the European Social Charter relating to the protection of health, safe working conditions, social, medical, and welfare assistance, social protection, and the right to protection against poverty and social exclusion.
A scathing report by the European Committee of Social Rights published this week found non-compliance with basic standards in multiple essential areas. Furthermore, much of the information submitted by Albania to the body for assessment was incomplete.
The European Social Charter is a treaty of the Council of Europe of which Albania is a member and therefore a signatory. It guarantees fundamental social and economic rights as a counterpart to the European Convention on Human Rights, which refers to civil and political rights. It ensures a broad range of everyday human rights related to employment, housing, health, education, social protection and welfare.
The Charter lays specific emphasis on protecting vulnerable persons such as older adults, children, people with disabilities and migrants. It requires that enjoyment of the abovementioned rights be guaranteed without discrimination.
Therefore, the Charter is seen as the Social Constitution of Europe and represents an essential component of the continent’s human rights architecture.
Article 3 of the charter refers to the right to safe and healthy working conditions. Albania has consistently failed to meet the standards for this article due to the government, not consulting employers and worker organisations on relevant matters.
There are also no provisions to protect workers from occupational health risks, including psychosocial risks. Furthermore, there was no protection for temporary workers and no stakeholders’ consultation at any point.
An “inadequate” level of protection for workers against asbestos was also reported as authorities have failed to draw up an inventory of locations that use it or take steps to protect workers who work where it is present.
On the topic of the right to safe and healthy working conditions, Albania failed in its enforcement of health and safety regulations. The report found that accidents at work and occupational diseases are not monitored effectively and the activities of the Labour Inspectoraate are not effective in practice. There are no measures to promote the progressive development of health services and no strategy to develop occupational health services for all workers.
Albania also failed Article 11 which deals with the right to protection of health. The report found that the public expenditure on health is too low and the provision of healthcare is subject to unnecessary delays.
In particular, Albania failed to provide information on life expectancy for urban, rural, ethnic groups and minorities. It also failed to provide information related to death rates for specific jobs or proximity to active industrial or contaminated sites. No information was provided on sexual and reproductive healthcare for women and girls, nor was there evidence of any policies to prevent premature death of women and girls in this context.
Important questions on abortion, maternal mortality, contraception, and blood-borne diseases remain non-conforming.
Other concerns were that health education should be included into the school curriculum, and that counselling and screening should be provided for pregnant women throughout the country.
Even more concerningly, the report noted that the government has failed to take adequate measures to protect citizens from environmental pollution. Also, on the topic of vaccinations, there was non-conformitty with the right to an efficient immunisation and epidemiological monitoring programme, noting that this is not in place in Albania.
