Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2011-07-04-Speech-1-250-000"
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"en.20110704.30.1-250-000"2
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"− Mr President, this report is about the future of universal social services and proposes pragmatic ideas for advancing the quality of those services, and decent working conditions for those who deliver them.
It is based on widespread consultation with civil society, with the social partners, and with local and regional authorities, and on detailed political compromises consolidating 285 amendments to the report. It is my objective to try to maintain the integrity of those compromises in the vote tomorrow.
A high-level stakeholders’ working group is proposed. For me this is the most important aspect of the report. We can differ here on matters of principle and on matters of law but the proposed working group provides us with an ongoing method to arrive at implementable solutions. I also propose a fourth Forum on Services of General Interest to monitor progress of the working group and other initiatives such as the European Voluntary Quality Framework.
Research consistently proves that social services, and public services more generally, are not only socially invaluable, but are also economically vital. Public services contribute 26% of our GDP and employ 64 million people, one third of whom are employed in the health and social services, while Eurofound research shows that public services are one of the most important ways of enhancing the citizens’ quality of life, ensuring full inclusion in society and providing for social and territorial cohesion.
The report as it stands outlines reforms to address the problems and legal uncertainties that providers and users have identified as needing urgent solutions, such as the difficulties arising from current procurement and state aid rules. It also proposes an active role for social economy enterprises and actors, urges that a race to the bottom be prevented through compliance by contractors and sub-contractors with Member States’ social, environmental, and quality criteria, and looks for an EU statute on mutual societies.
The world has changed dramatically since 2007, the last occasion on which social services were addressed in this Parliament. The ‘light regulation’ economic model, assiduously promoted by the Commission and the Council over many years, spectacularly collapsed at the end of that year. That collapse has had enormous human, social and economic costs. Some Member States’ debt and budget deficits have reached crisis levels as a consequence of the nationalisation of privately owned bank debt, resulting in vicious austerity programmes which are hitting the vulnerable hardest.
The pressures generated by this situation are putting massive strain on the funding of social services, and the report calls for enhanced EU programmes and for project bonds to help address those problems. Because of the economic and unemployment crisis our citizens face, they have a greater need than ever for access to high quality social services, while our economies and our societies also need the added value which such services can deliver.
I hope that this report can be adopted in full tomorrow and look forward to working with all the stakeholders to ensure that our citizens get the services they deserve. To conclude I want to thank everybody who worked with me on this report – the shadows, the staff, those in civil society – who took part and indeed brought forward many innovative ideas which I hope the working group will be in a position to develop over the time to come."@en1
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