Strasbourg, 02/10/2006 (Agence Europe) - Last week the European Parliament adopted, by 535 votes to 18, with 10 abstentions, the report by Thomas Mann (EPP-ED, Germany) on the creation of a European Qualifications Framework (EQF). The aim of the EQF is to create a European framework which will enable qualifications systems at national and sectoral levels to relate to one another, in order to encourage professional mobility between Member States and better respond to supply and demand requirements on the European labour market.
The rapporteur considered that the aim of having life-long learning play a major role in maintaining competitiveness and the social cohesion of the EU was very difficult to achieve because of the lack of communication and cooperation between the various education and training systems and politics. “With the help of the EQF, many barriers should be removed and employees and employers able to make better use of their skills. Mobility between the Member States and various systems of education should be made easier,” said Mr Mann. The report, however, picks up some “critical points” in the Commission's current proposal, among which is the lack of a clear link with the labour market. As the aim of the framework is to increase the European economy's competitiveness, with a view to meeting the revised Lisbon aims, the emphasis should be much more on applicants' employability, he stressed. He also noted that the framework could only become fully effective if qualifications were listed according to appropriateness: “Therefore, the proposal must take into account not only formal diplomas but also the informal and non-formal qualifications, in particular professional experience and the wider aspects of competence”. The report recommends that descriptors be reviewed not only taking account of and retaining the Bologna criteria associated with university education, but completing them taking greater account of systems of education and vocational training. Consequently it considers that the European Qualifications Framework must be a logical and structured starting point for the creation of a wider body of mutual compatibilities. MEPs, therefore, called on the Commission to further develop other instruments, such as the European credit transfer system for education and vocational training, Europass, the “Ploteus” database. It should also do more to encourage innovative approaches to recognition of informal and non-formal learning.