Brussels, 17/06/2013 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission is proposing to improve the efficiency of the public employment services of the member states to tackle the problem of the 26 million people unemployed in Europe.
On Monday 17 June, the commissioner for social affairs, Laszlo Andor, presented a proposal for a decision to network these public employment services, which advise the unemployed on training, apprenticeship, work placement and employment opportunities, but also allow supply and demand to come together. This is what the German, Spanish, French and Italian employment ministers called for at their meeting in Rome on Friday 14 June (see EUROPE 10867). “In order to fight the plague of unemployment, we need to improve the efficiency and performance of the public employment services, which have a role to play in policies to give momentum to the employment market. The Commission's proposal will help these services to fulfil this vital role and promote greater European coordination of policies in this field”.
The creation of a network as suggested by the European Commission would, first of all, help to detect problems related to the employment market earlier, but also to assess performances on the basis of reference values. If they were interconnected, these services would also help to bring about a better transposition of employment policies in the member states, particularly the recommendations for each individual country listed in the framework of the European semester, or the "Youth Guarantee" (which provides that within four months of a young person entering the employment market, he or she will have the opportunity to get a job, a work placement, and apprenticeship or additional training). The European executive also takes the view that the network will help to make the most of best practices and facilitate exchange.
At this stage, a group of public employment services has already existed informally since 1997. The Commission's proposal would, on the one hand, make it possible to formalise the activities of this group, and on the other, to give it a clear mandate. This would also make it easier to implement projects targeting employment and paid for by the European Social Fund. The cooperation of the public employment services within EURES, the pan-European job-seeking network, would continue to exist.
The decision proposed by the Commission will now be the subject of an examination by the Council and the Parliament. Following their approval, the network of the 27 public employment services can be set in place. Each country will appoint one member and one alternate member to sit on the board of the Public Employment Services Network; the Commission will also be represented.
The idea of reinforced cooperation between these services has not been ruled out and this will be discussed at a summit on youth unemployment to be held in Berlin on 3 July, further to the meeting of the employment ministers in Rome last Friday, and in Madrid on 19 June. The European Council of 28 and 29 July will also be devoted to the fight against youth unemployment. (MD/transl.fl)