SOCIAL ISSUES
EU Commission on the ability to respond to old and new forms of poverty
Child poverty, healthcare, employment and pension system reform. These are the key issues examined by the Commission to assess Community Europe and its Member States’ response to “traditional” (poverty) and “emerging” (evolving long-term care needs) social issues. The executive pointed to the progress made in this field, although the targets set by the EU in the past years have not yet been achieved.Economic growth is not sufficient. The Commission’s analyses are part of the “Joint Report on Social Protection and Social Inclusion 2008” debated by the 27’s Council of Ministers on February 29. The document will be presented to EU heads of government and State on March 13-14 “with the purpose of illustrating the social dimension of the growth and employment package”. The Spring summit will be an opportunity for an overview of the Lisbon Strategy as relates to competitiveness, development, the “economy of knowledge”, “quality employment” and “social cohesion”. “Our social protection and social inclusion policy reforms are giving results”, explained Commissioner Vladimír pidla, responsible for EU policies in this field. “However, a vigorous growth and more job opportunities don’t necessarily imply the improvement of marginalized brackets. The different policies ought to interact in order to ensure the full inclusion of more vulnerable subjects”. Too many poor children in Europe. The Report presented this year by the Commission was focused on a series of “key issues” enabling to monitor problems relating to citizens, the family, weaker brackets risking marginalization and those with lower opportunities. Outstanding difficulties were registered due to the different situation in adherent Countries, different living standards and different wages and public services (schools and hospitals). According to the Report, 16% of EU citizens “are exposed to the risk of poverty”, while 8% have insufficient income despite their in-work status. “Out of 78 million Europeans living on the threshold of poverty, 19 million are children”. The college of Commissioners voiced the need for “targeted social policies to interrupt the circle of poverty and exclusion, ensuring that all children access education providing equal opportunities to all”. Stepping up anti-discrimination policies “for migrant workers and their children, along with ethnic minorities” is viewed as a crucial factor. Employment and child care facilities. Children whose parents are unemployed or marked by “low work intensity”, or “low wages” are more exposed to the risk of poverty. While National income support measures are “not enough to overcome poverty risk”. The fight against poverty entails “a positive combination of job opportunities enabling greater access to the labour market, adequate income support measures along with family and child care services”. It is not by chance that the EU has been repeatedly asking Member States to invest in kindergartens and nursery schools. Health and welfare: disparities in the EU. Another criteria enabling the evaluation of social cohesion relates to health care. The Report stresses the “wide disparities” existing in the health sector traveling from Estonia to Portugal, from Finland to Malta. Just one figure says it all: men’s life expectancy ranges from 65.3 years in Lithuania to 78.8 in Cyprus and Sweden; for women figures range from 76.2 in Romania to 84.4 in France. For this reason, more investments should be made in the medical field, in hospitals, and health services. Without neglecting “daily” health defense measures like the promotion of healthy life habits (food, sport, health prevention), reserving special attention to the “more marginalized social brackets”, such as the very elderly living alone, the disabled and seriously ill patients, families living on the threshold of society and ethnic minorities. The Report’s remarks on employment, focus on the situation of 55-64 year olds (with an unjustified underestimation of the serious youth unemployment rates), demographic ageing, pension systems and welfare reforms.
