Brussels, 10/06/2011 (Agence Europe) - The country-specific recommendations adopted by the European Commission on 7 June 2011 (see EUROPE 10393) are of great concern to the European Anti-Poverty Network (EAPN), worried that they do not address the root causes of current problems in Europe. EAPN says they fail to take the poverty reduction target seriously and will result in greater poverty and exclusion. They are “a betrayal of the hopes of people experiencing poverty and anti-poverty organisations across Europe that trusted in the commitments to poverty reduction made by President Barroso and the EU”, said EAPN President Ludo Horemans. EAPN sent a letter to social affairs ministers on Thursday 9 June highlighting its concerns and urging social ministers to take a stronger stand to defend social rights.
The recommendations focus on reducing pubic deficits, which will lead to cutting public services and wages, and increasing retirement ages, says EAPN which had been expecting a clear focus on addressing the target to reduce poverty by at least 20 million by 2020. While the Commission acknowledges that member states will need to do more to reach the agreed EU poverty-reduction target, they make no credible recommendations about how to achieve this, EAPN says.
Horemans argues that the recommendations do not address the fundamental causes of the problems being faced in Europe today: growing concentration of wealth in the hands of a few, the dominance of financial speculators, the decline in quality of employment, and the constant erosion of public services and social welfare systems.
Fintan Farrell, Director of EAPN, said many member states had not even respected the target and indicators they agreed at the EU Council in June 2010 and “even this the Commission lets go by without comment”. He added: “Worse still the recommendations are likely to generate more poverty and social exclusion and will put more pressure on people experiencing poverty by punishing them for failing to find jobs that are in scarce supply”. (G.B./transl.rt)