Brussels, 10/11/2005 (Agence Europe) - On Thursday, the European Commission adopted a communication representing its contribution to the progress report 2006 on the programme "Education and Training 2010", which the Council of ministers is to discuss next Tuesday (see other article). The conclusions of the report indicated that although the Member States are on the right track with their reforms, they must yet speed up the pace of them, otherwise a considerable proportion of the next generation will be faced with social exclusion. Too little progress has been made compared to the European reference levels ("benchmarks") set for the improvement of the qualifications and skills of young people and currently, there are still 80 million workers with low levels of qualifications on the market, the Commission points out. In order to help the Member States to continue with their efforts, the Commission has published a proposed recommendation to establish a European framework for key skills in parallel to its communication. This recommendation defines the knowledge that all Europeans need in order to succeed professionally and socially. Eight key skills have been defined: 1) communication in the mother tongue; 2) communication in a foreign language; 3) mathematical knowledge and basic skills in science and technology; 4) digital culture; 5) "learning to learn"; 6) interpersonal, inter-cultural, social and civic skills; 7) entrepreneurship; 8) cultural expression. (Information: http: //europa.eu.int/comm/education/policies/2010/et_2010_fr.html).