Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-05-20-Speech-2-039"
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"Ladies and gentlemen, strict Parliament rules do not allow me to reply to your speeches in detail. However, allow me to thank you for the substantial debate, which analysed many aspects of the labour market and of the European Employment Strategy, and allow me to talk about just a few fundamental issues.
Firstly, the European Employment Strategy has brought tangible results. The current statistics on unemployment and employment are much better than they have been since the 1980s, which is a clear success. In your debate you often expressed your worries concerning quality jobs. I want to point out that the concept of more jobs and more quality jobs is a part of the Lisbon Strategy for growth and employment. What is the result? Of the millions of new jobs, more than half are full-time jobs and there can be no question marks over their quality. Many of the remaining jobs are part-time jobs or fixed-term jobs.
In my opinion, the hypothesis that none of the fixed-term and part-time jobs is a high-quality job does not hold water. It is not tenable. Many of these jobs are quality jobs. However, there is no doubt that some of these jobs are not quality jobs and this is one of the areas that we must sort out. My personal view is that the problem of the working poor, that is, the people who continue to be poor despite having a job, is very worrying and we have to pay more attention to it. According to the available data, the working poor account for approximately 8% of the working population, which is a considerable amount. We are talking about millions of people and this is a very pressing issue.
Another issue you debated is the link between employment policies and social inclusion. Let me point out that Guideline No 19 puts emphasis on an inclusive labour market and on promoting the inclusion of disadvantaged people in the labour market. This is because the Commission recommended in the Strategy that substantial changes should not be made to these Guidelines. This is because they have proved to be successful and because it has become clear that in order to ensure good governance, a better balance between European and national level (indeed, most Member States expressed such views), it would be best not to expand the Guidelines. On the other hand, it is clear that the text is not cast in stone, that it will continue to develop and that the topics you mentioned are undoubtedly the topics that will require an appropriate response in accordance with future developments.
I would like to answer another question concerning the application of Article 139 of the Treaty. Paradoxically, the collective agreement in the maritime sector will be signed today, and it has already been decided to introduce this collective agreement into European legislation through Article 139. In other words, this is a concrete step showing that this article has not been neglected. By the way, I see the maritime sector agreement as an extremely important step forward because this is a very complex and highly international sector, and the social partners have managed to achieve a significant amount.
Of course there were other topics in the debate: the issue of education, the significant number of early school leavers, lifelong learning. All these topics are important and to a certain extent will be included in the new social agenda. Regarding inclusion, I would like to draw your attention to the Commission communication on active inclusion, which is one of the documents outlining the Commission’s strategy in this area. Let me stress that although the labour market is the basis for active inclusion, it does not extend to all areas where the application of a coherent inclusion policy is needed. Since there are clearly many people who are outside the labour market for natural reasons, such as pensioners or people who find themselves in various unusual circumstances, the inclusion policy must cover more than just the labour market. The European labour market strategy clearly has to take this aspect into account.
Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to thank you once more for the debate, which, in my opinion, covered most of the important topics concerning the European labour market. I think that they make a significant contribution to the process of finding a better and more effective balance between the European Employment Strategy and the activities of the individual Member States. As I said before, there were many very interesting comments made in the course of the debate but Parliament’s rules make it impossible for me to respond to all of them, which is why I responded to only a few."@en1
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