MOTION FOR A RESOLUTION on Youth Employment
15.7.2014 - (2014/2713(RSP))
pursuant to Rule 123(2) of the Rules of Procedure
David Casa, Ivo Belet, José Manuel Fernandes, Verónica Lope Fontagné, Agnieszka Kozłowska-Rajewicz, Elisabeth Morin-Chartier, Siegfried Mureşan, Anne Sander, Davor Ivo Stier, Renate Weber, Heinz K. Becker, Sofia Ribeiro on behalf of the PPE Group
See also joint motion for a resolution RC-B8-0027/2014
The European Parliament,
– having regard to its report on the proposal for a Council decision on guidelines for the employment policies of the Member States: Part II of the Europe 2020 Integrated Guidelines (COM(2010)0193 – C7-0111/2010 – 2010/0115(NLE)),
– having regard to the Commission communication of 20 December 2011 entitled ‘Youth Opportunities Initiative’ (COM(2011)0933),
– having regard to the Council conclusions, adopted in Luxembourg on 17 June 2011, on promoting youth employment to achieve the Europe 2020 objectives,
– having regard to the Commission communication on the implementation of the Youth Opportunities Initiative (COM(2012)0727),
– having regard to the proposal from the Commission of 5 December 2012 for a Council Recommendation on establishing a Youth Guarantee (COM(2012)0729),
– having regard to the European Council conclusions of 7 February 2013 on a Youth Employment Initiative,
– having regard to its resolution of 16 January 2013 on a Youth Guarantee[1],
– having regard to the Council recommendation of 22 April 2013 on establishing a Youth Guarantee,
– having regard to its resolution of 11 September 2013 on tackling youth unemployment: possible ways out[2],
– having regard to its resolution of 16 January 2014 on respect for the fundamental right of free movement in the EU[3],
– having regard to its report on the proposal for a decision of the European Parliament and of the Council on enhanced co-operation between Public Employment Services (PES) (COM(2013)0430 – C7-0177/2013 – 2013/0202(COD)),
– having regard to Rule 123(2) of its Rules of Procedure,
A. whereas the European Union is facing great challenges, with a high unemployment rate of 10.4 % in April 2014 for the EU28, where the unemployment rate for young people is reaching the level of 22.5 % for the same period, and in some countries has surpassed 50 %;
B. whereas in March 2014, 5.340 million young people (under 25) were unemployed in the EU28, 3.426 million of whom were in the euro area;
C. whereas a Youth Guarantee would contribute to fulfilling three of the Europe 2020 strategy objectives, namely that 75 % of the population aged 20-64 should be employed, that early-school-leaving rates should be below 10 %, and that at least 20 million people should be lifted out of poverty and social exclusion;
D. whereas 7.5 million Europeans under the age of 25 are neither in employment nor in education or training (NEETs); and these figures are continuing to rise, thus posing the risk of a lost generation;
E. whereas by emphasis on practical skills, the dual system of vocational training and also the combined academic-vocational degree courses employed in some Member States have proven their worth during the crisis in particular, keeping levels of youth unemployment lower by making young people more employable;
F. whereas an increasing number of young people continue their studies between 25 and 30 years of age because they do not have the opportunity to find employment;
G. whereas SMEs have an important job creation potential and play a crucial role in the transition towards a new, sustainable economy;
H. whereas despite the number of workers moving from one Member State to another increasing from 4.7 million in 2005 to 8 million in 2008, in percentage terms that is an increase from 2.1 % to 3.3 % of the total labour force;
I. whereas Member States have a crucial role to play in combating youth unemployment, also through the financial support of EU-financed instruments such as the European Social Fund, the European Programme for Employment and Social Innovation (EaSI) and the Youth Guarantee for the programming period 2014-2020;
J. whereas the European Union has allocated EUR 6 billion to support employment of people under the age of 25;
1. Calls for efficient monitoring of the implementation of the Youth Guarantee;
2. Calls on the European Commission to accelerate the establishment of the Youth Employment Initiative and to publish a communication on how it has been established before the end of 2014;
3. Encourages the Member States to consider extending the Youth Guarantee to young people under 30 years of age;
4. Calls on the Member States to reform, in particular, education and training standards for young people, in order to significantly increase their employability and life opportunities;
5. Calls on the Member States to focus on sectors with high growth and job creation potential and take measures to prioritise the areas of science, technology, engineering and mathematics in their educational programmes in order to meet expected future developments on the labour market;
6. Underlines the need for Europe to create an SME-friendly environment, which includes providing the best financial and legal conditions for start-up businesses, as overall SMEs accounted for 66.5 % of all European jobs in 2012[4];
7. Reiterates the need to ensure wide and easy training and access to Internet and online information and to digital skills; in line with the Digital Agenda’s objectives, calls on Member States to encourage and facilitate the digitalisation of services and education opportunities for young people in order to enable them to access digital jobs;
8. Insists there is a need for the reindustrialisation of Europe based on a coherent strategy and its implementation, which will promote and facilitate growth-friendly policies and creation of new jobs;
9. Urges the Member States to implement strong measures to fight youth unemployment and early exclusion from the labour market, in particular through preventive action against early dropout from school or from training or apprenticeship schemes (e.g. by implanting a dual educational system or other equally efficient types of framework);
10. Underlines that delivering on the objectives of a Youth Guarantee requires strategic reforms to achieve more successful transitions from school to the labour market;
11. Urges the Member States to respectively build up and reform their labour market agencies;
12. Calls on the Member States and on the European Commission to support and promote mobility mechanisms, in particular EURES, which facilitate job seeking in other Member States;
13. Calls on the Member States to make full use of the Public Employment Services (PES) in order to balance the offer and demand of employment vacancies and qualifications required between Member States;
14. Calls on the European Commission to support initiatives as well as other forms of cooperation with the private sector in tackling youth unemployment;
15. Calls on the European Commission to take a leading role with an initiative for the reindustrialisation of Europe, enhancing industrial competitiveness without placing an excessive regulatory burden on businesses, and facilitating job creation, tackling unemployment and enlarging the scope of possibilities for young people to start their own businesses or to find a job;
16. Calls on the Member States to eliminate unnecessary administrative burdens and bureaucracy for the self-employed, micro-enterprises and SMEs and to facilitate the conditions for start-up businesses. SMEs constitute a large share of the European economy and their role can be a key determinant in ensuring a prompt and sustainable recovery from the economic crisis and creating new jobs, including for young people;
17. Calls on the Member States to improve cooperation between businesses and the education sector at all levels, with a scope of better linking curricula to the demands of the labour market and avoiding creation of ‘bottlenecks’, which negatively affects the labour market participants;
18. Calls on the Member States to pay particular attention to high youth unemployment rates among disadvantaged groups, giving priority to accession and integration into the labour market and the mainstreaming of accession and integration policies, as employment is the key to successful integration;
19. Urges Member States to strengthen, and to remove existing cross-border barriers to vocational training, orientation and apprenticeships, traineeships and internships, and to better match the supply and demand of work-based training opportunities for young people, thereby improving mobility and employability, particularly in border regions;
20. Welcomes the Council recommendation on a Quality Framework for Traineeships, adopted on 10 March 2014, and calls on the Member States to implement it without any delay in favour of its addressees, and underlines the fact that the Member States’ programmes promoting and offering traineeships can be financially supported by European funds;
21. Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Commission and the Council.
- [1] Texts adopted, P7_TA(2013)0016.
- [2] Texts adopted, P7_TA(2013)0365.
- [3] Texts adopted, P7_TA(2014)0037.
- [4] http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/policies/sme/facts-figures-analysis/performance-review/files/supporting-documents/2013/annual-report-smes-2013_en.pdf report