Brussels, 17/04/2014 (Agence Europe) - While highlighting its disagreement with the legal interpretation of an extremely important point in the text, the European Parliament nevertheless approved on Wednesday 16 April - by 509 votes in favour, 21 against and one abstention - the draft directive for improving cooperation with the Public Employment Services (PESs). The European PESs network is now well and truly official but participation in it will be compulsory or voluntary, according to the different points of view.
This point created a number of difficulties as soon as the Council's position was adopted in December 2013 (see EUROPE 10980). Inter-institutional negotiations (see EUROPE 10993) that followed failed to clarify this legal problem. During the plenary session debate in Strasbourg, the rapporteur for the European Parliament, Frédéric Daerden MEP (S&D, Belgium), referred to this controversy again and asserted that “our discussions have not allowed us to reach a decision due to the diverging legal interpretations of the Council, on the one hand, and the Commission and Parliament, on the other”. The Council sought to attach a declaration to the text regarding the voluntary character of participation (although all member states are committed to taking part in it). The solution proposed by the rapporteur is that Parliament adopts its own statement that goes in the opposite direction. The Parliament's declaration on the setting up of a Public Employment Services network was accepted by a very large majority at the plenary (461 votes for, 69 against and 43 abstentions). It stipulates that all member states should take part in the network. During the debate, European Commissioner for Employment and Social Affairs Laszlo Andor announced that he sought to follow the opinion advocated by the Parliament. (JK)