Decision (EU) 2023/936 on a European Year of Skills

Ce que fait l'acte

PROPOSED ACT: Decision of the European Parliament and of the Council. ROLE OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT: the European Parliament decides in accordance with the ordinary legislative procedure and on an equal footing with the Council. BACKGROUND: a skilled workforce is crucial to ensuring socially fair and just green and digital transitions , and to strengthening the Union’s sustainable competitiveness and resilience in the face of adverse external shocks such as the COVID-19 pandemic or the fallout of Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine. A workforce with the right skills is a precondition for the green transition too, forecasted to generate 2.5 million additional jobs in the EU by 2030. In 2021, 28 occupations were classified as having shortages , including the healthcare, hospitality, construction and service sectors, in addition to shortages of IT and security specialists, in particular cybersecurity experts, and workers with science, technology, engineering and mathematics background. The Committee on Employment and Social Affairs adopted a report by Loucas FOURLAS (EPP, CY) on the proposal for a decision of the European Parliament and of the Council on a European Year of Skills 2023. The committee responsible recommended that the European Parliament's position adopted at first reading under the ordinary legislative procedure should amend the proposal as follows: Members proposed that the year starting from 9 May 2023 until 8 May 2024 should be designated as the ‘European Year of Skills’ (European Year). The overall objective of the European Year has been clarified by the committee. - enhance continuous learning, employability and career progression, and to provide sustainable, lifelong learning systems; - promote access to decent wages that ensure a decent standard of living; - promote the creation of quality jobs and retention strategies as the best way to attract and retain a skilled workforce and provide incentives for employers to invest in the development of their workers´ skills; - promote decent working conditions at company level to attract and retain skilled workers; - promote the increased mobility of the workers in the Union under the Erasmus+ and European Solidarity Corps programmes for students, apprentices, teachers and trainers, while aiming for the better recognition of the skills and competences acquired during periods of mobility. New types of measures have been added by Members to achieve the main objectives of the initiative. These include, inter alia : - initiatives targeting inter alia individuals, employers, in particular SMEs; - supporting social dialogue, collective bargaining and the role of the social partners in designing national, sectoral and company-specific skills strategies and training; - promoting and further implementing tools and instruments for increased transparency of qualifications, including qualifications awarded outside the Union, including the improvement of the validation systems and the automatic mutual recognition, validation, and certification of those qualifications, and of skills acquired in non-formal or informal settings; - developing a toolbox to support disadvantaged groups, in…