Brussels, 24/04/2013 (Agence Europe) - Twenty four hours apart, the Council of the EU and the European Parliament have each laid down their positions on the youth guarantee mechanism and the inter-institutional negotiations will be able to start. The starting positions are a good distance apart on many points, particularly on the scope of application of the guarantee, but they are identical over the budgetary envelope, specifically €6 billion of European co-funding.
On Monday 22 April, the Agriculture and Fisheries Council approved the recommendation on the guarantee, thereby confirming the political agreement reached by the European ministers for employment and social affairs at the end of February. In line with the European Commission's proposal, the Council is proposing that all young people of under the age of 25 who are out of work after finishing their studies will receive, within four months, a quality job offer, a proposal for further training, apprenticeship or work placement. The regions within the EU to be affected are those with a youth unemployment rate of more than 25%.
The stance of the European Parliament was adopted on Tuesday 23 April, during the vote of the employment and social affairs committee on amendments to the regulation on the European social fund (ESF) and amendments for opinion only to the general regulation on the structural funds to implement the youth employment initiative, which includes the youth guarantee as its central component. The MEPs take the view that the criteria selected by the Council and Commission cover too few of the 5.6 million young Europeans currently out of work. They are proposing to extend the scope of the guarantee mechanism to young people below the age of 30 and to regions with youth unemployment above 20%. (JK/transl.fl)