Spidla says EU labour concerns are unjustified

The leader of the ruling Social Democrats, Vladimir Spidla, told the German Chancellor, Gerhard Schroeder, on Tuesday that Germany's concerns over a massive influx of labour from the Czech Republic after EU expansion were unjustified. Speaking during a meeting of European Social Democrats in Berlin, Mr Spidla said there has been no evidence of any such intentions among Czechs and claimed that, on the contrary, research shows that Czechs are unlikely to leave the country in search of work.

Havel rejects EU labour concerns

Czech President Vaclav Havel has also rejected Austrian and German fears that EU enlargement will lead to their markets being flooded with cheap labour from post-Communist countries. Mr Havel's statement came during a meeting with the Belgian Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt in Prague on Monday. The president said he found it hard to imagine that thousands of Czechs would try to seek work in current EU member states and said that a proposed transition period preventing the free movement of labour from candidate countries would not be fair.