Li Andersson (The Left, Finnish), newly elected to the European Parliament, will take the helm of the Committee on Employment and Social Affairs (EMPL) next week. Chairperson of the Left Alliance party since 2016, which she will leave in the autumn, she explains to Agence Europe her main priorities for the next 5 years. (Interview by Solenn Paulic)
Agence Europe - In a few days' time you will be chairing the European Parliament’s Committee on Employment and Social Affairs. What is your background?
Li Andersson - I have been in the Finnish Parliament for 9 years and I've also been the Chairperson of my party for the last 8 years. I was part of the five-party coalition government led by Sanna Marin (former Prime Minister of Finland).
I was Minister of Education, also responsible for vocational education and adult education, as well as primary education and early childhood care.
In the Finnish Parliament, I also worked on labour market, social and healthcare issues.
The ‘EMPL’ Committee was my number one priority, because that is where you deal with labour market issues as well as social policy, housing and poverty issues. EMPL is also where labour market policies are discussed.
If we look back over the last few years, we have seen many protests, we have seen many people dealing with difficulties linked to rising energy prices, food costs...
The EU should invest and focus much more on the social side of policies and labour market criminality; for example, dangerous substances in the workplace or psychological problems generated at work and how this can also be regulated.
For European projects to have legitimacy in the eyes of the people of Europe, the next Commission should focus on social policy and enhance the position of workers. And the EMPL Committee is at the core of this.
What new instruments should be used to invest in this social policy? The S&D group, for example, is calling for a European Commissioner for Housing.
Firstly it is crucial to look at EU’s rules for budgetary and economic policy. Our group voted against them because they do not take into consideration the need to invest in social policy. You can really see a return of austerity in Europe, which will only make matters worse.
On housing, at EU level, we need to share the best practices put in place by countries that have succeeded in reducing homelessness. Finland has a great deal of experience in this area and has set itself the target of completely eradicating homelessness.
But that also means that countries must be given the space to invest in social housing and city planning to ensure that there are sufficient rental apartments constructed and rented on a non-profit basis. The Commission can do more to share these practices.
I also hope that the Commission will raise the issue of the working poor. We will have to follow up on the directive on adequate minimum wages, which was a very important step during the last legislature.
Trade unions are also concerned about the growing trend in Europe, linked to austerity, to restrict the right to strike or restrict collective agreements.
This is also why a campaign has been launched by elected representatives from four political groups (The Left, the Greens/EFA, the EPP and the S&D) to reform the rules on public procurement to better take into consideration collective agreements and collective bargaining rights. It is also a concrete way for the EU to ensure that there are fair rules on the labour market.
I also hope that the Commission will continue its work on regulating dangerous substances in the workplace. And we also need regulations on working in very hot conditions, a consequence of climate change, which we also need to address to ensure the well-being of workers.
In your view, are there still any ‘nasty’ surprises to come in the next few months on issues such as platform working, which still has to be formally validated by the Council of the EU?
I hope not, and that no Member State will want to reopen the issue, because it is already now a negotiated compromise. I hope that all Member States will see the need to continue along this path and move on to the implementation phase, which will be extremely important, because the end result of the Platform Workers Directive will depend very much on how Member States incorporate it into their national laws.
Can the next Commission be as ambitious as the previous one, given the new, more right-wing configuration of the European Parliament?
I really hope that everyone understands that the election results and the protests that have taken place all around Europe show that we need to work harder to address the issues of poverty, the housing crisis and the exploitation of workers in the labour market.
We also need to ensure that the green transition is fair, so that people have the possibility to cope with the changes, especially as we move towards extending the ETS (CO2 trading scheme) to transport and buildings. It is important to secure public support for these transitions.
These will be important issues for many groups in the European Parliament and there will certainly be pressure from them; I hope that this pressure will also show in the choice of the next Commissioners and the work programmes. The hearings of the new Commissioners will be important in assessing ambition and, personally, I will work for policy that is as ambitious as possible.
If you had to send a ‘candidacy’ message to those who will elect you next week to head the EMPL Committee, what would it be?
As I said, as a minister I have had the possibility to work with different political groups working in government and I also worked on issues related to vocational education, adult education, social and health issues. I have also worked extensively on labour market issues and with trade unions in my home country.
The main message is this: all the political developments in Europe, with the rise of the extreme right in far too many countries, really show the need for the EU to be more ambitious, more imaginative when it comes to labour markets and social policy.
The EU must really do more to secure workers’ rights, to do more to combat exploitation, to combat the housing crisis.
For all these reasons, our EMPL Committee will play a very important role, and I hope that this will be shared by the other political groups, as well as by the next Commission.