While the European Commission will be adopting a Communication on Quality Jobs on 3 December and launching various consultations with the European social partners at the same time, the members of the European Parliament’s Committee on Employment and Social Affairs will be asked to vote on the same day on the own-initiative report by Jana Toom (Renew Europe, Estonian) calling for a directive on just transitions.
This directive is also being called for by the European trade unions, while the employers, as well as a section of Parliament led by the EPP, want to limit new legislation in the ‘Employment’ and ‘Social’ areas. In her report, the MEP notes that “the effects of the twin transition on employment are asymmetrical across the Union; whereas decarbonisation has a stronger negative socio-economic impact on regions with a high share of employment in the mining and extractive sectors”.
Considering that participation in adult training remains insufficient, with only 39.5% of adults taking part in training each year, well below the target of at least 60% set for 2030, and that some 50 million more workers would need to be trained to reach this target, her report also notes that implementation of the Just Transition Fund has been slow, as evidenced by the payment rate of only 32.2% at the end of 2024.
She points out that “the number of jobs created by the Just Transition Fund is not on track to cover the number of jobs forecast to be lost as carbon-intensive industries shift to cleaner technologies”.
The report, which is non-binding, applauds the announcement of legislation on quality employment (planned for the end of 2026), which will aim to ensure “that employment practices keep up with developments in the modern economy”. The report stresses “the need for this Act together with the forthcoming update of the European Pillar of Social Rights Action Plan and the new Quality Jobs ‘Roadmap’ to include a set of concrete legislative and non-legislative measures that tangibly improve the working conditions, health and safety, collective bargaining coverage and training and skills of workers’ and the self-employed”.
These measures should also be “an opportunity to support Union employers, particularly SMEs, to retain and improve their competitiveness by providing a clear framework for anticipating and managing change in partnership with workers and to invest in vocational education and training (VET), up-skilling and re-skilling workers”.
The directive proposed by Parliament should therefore be accompanied by a revamped Just Transition Fund for the post-2027 programming period, helping employers to guarantee workers’ right to training and to roll out transition plans at company level.
According to several sources, the Commission could propose a single piece of legislation by the end of 2026, combining responses on the just transition, artificial intelligence in the workplace and psychosocial risks.
Parliament is also concerned about a possible backtracking by the Commission on the action plan for the social rights pillar and will shortly be putting an oral question to Vice-President Roxana Mînzatu to find out whether the institution still intends to propose a new plan.
Link to the report: https://aeur.eu/f/jq6 (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)