Brussels, 14/09/2001 (Agence Europe) - At the Belgian Presidency Conference on social inclusion indicators, being held in Antwerp on 14 and 15 September (see EUROPE of 13 September, p.17), the European Anti-Poverty Network (EAPN) is to submit proposals on the matter. For EAPN, the best indicators are those which gauge changes in the everyday lives of people living in poverty and social exclusion, and can only be determined by involving people undertaking meticulous research. According to EAPN, the indicators selected in December will have to be closely linked to the objectives adopted in Nice, and must therefore reflect the impact of public policies on access to rights, resources and services such as income, work, education and training, healthcare, housing, and family life.
EAPN's proposals will be presented in Antwerp in the form of a non-exhaustive list of specific indicators in five different areas: 1) poverty: for example, the rate of poverty before and after tax and social transfers; - persistence of poverty; - percentage of households who face difficulties in x items out of a list to be developed; - percentage of children living in poor households; 2) employment: (long-term unemployment rates, indicator of precarious unemployment; 3) education/training: notably, young people leaving school without any qualification; 4) health: for example, the number of people who cannot have access to healthcare through lack of means; 5) housing: in particular, the number of homeless people or living in substandard or overcrowded housing.
The full version of these proposals is available at the following address: http://www.eapn.org Info: EAPN in Brussels. Tel.: 02 230 44 55. Fax: 02 230 97 33. E-mail: team@eapn.skynet.be