On Tuesday 13 June, the European Commission presented a proposal for an EU Council Recommendation, as well as a specific website, to encourage the development of the social and solidarity economy in the Member States and help increase its potential, particularly in terms of employment.
While only half of the Member States have a legal framework to support social economy enterprises, the draft recommendation calls on all Member States to put in place specific “national strategies”, as explained by Commission Vice-President Valdis Dombrovskis and European Commissioner Nicolas Schmit.
It also calls on them to design labour market policies that support employees in social enterprises, promote social entrepreneurship and guarantee fair working conditions through social dialogue and collective bargaining.
In addition, the social economy can help to achieve the objectives set for 2030 by the social rights pillar, on poverty, employment and training.
The recommendation calls on Member States to “acknowledge the role of the social economy in social inclusion, for example in the provision of social and care services and accessible and quality housing, in particular for disadvantaged groups, or to improve access to public and private finance, including EU funds, and to enable the social economy to access business opportunities and public procurement markets”.
It is also a question of “making use of the possibilities offered by the rules on State aid to support the social economy, including the provisions on start-up aid for businesses, reintegration of disadvantaged workers and support for local infrastructure”, explains the Commission in a press release.
Member States’ tax systems must also support the social economy by providing appropriately designed tax incentives.
The social and solidarity economy represents up to 10% of GDP in some Member States such as France, the recommendation points out, and employs 13.6 million people in the EU.
The social economy covers a wide range of private entities that focus on people, social and environmental causes rather than profit. It generally covers cooperatives, mutual societies, associations (including charities), foundations and social organisations. They are managed with participative governance.
“However, the measures taken by the Member States have not always produced effective results”, the recommendation states. This can be attributed to: “- a lack of clarity and understanding of the principles and scope of the social economy; - insufficient recognition of the added value of the social economy for society and the economy, particularly as a response to emerging problems; - support measures that lack consistency over time and/or unnecessarily restrict social economy entities to specific activities or types of activity; - or the fragmentation of legal frameworks; - a lack of accurate data and statistics on the sector, or - a lack of funding tailored to the different stages in the life cycle of social economy entities”.
The online portal should help companies in the sector to find out about the European funding available and European regulations.
Links to the recommendation and to the portal: https://aeur.eu/f/7h1 ; https://aeur.eu/f/7gm (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)