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1 1. Background Acting on a proposal from Mr Flynn, Commissioner responsible for Social Affairs and Employment, the Commission has just given its approval, in principle, to a series of programming documents relating to Objective 4. Formal adoption will take place once the ESF Committee has given its opinion. This new Objective, introduced following revision of the Structural Fund Regulations, will make an important contribution towards helping the workforce adapt to industrial change and towards boosting the competitiveness of businesses. The programming documents approved in principle cover eight Member States. These documents take the form of Single Programming Documents for all Member States except Belgium, which has opted for a Community Support Framework. At the same time the Commission has adopted a communication representing an interim report on this first phase of implementation of Objective 4. 2. The main priorities of Objective 4 Objective 4 is designed to "facilitate the adaptation of workers of either sex to industrial change and to changes in production systems". To achieve this, the following guidelines have been adopted: Anticipation, aiming to identify trends and anticipate the development of employment, trades, skills and qualifications as a preliminary to concrete training measures, should provide firms with improved capacity for managing the process of change in production systems. The horizontal approach, which is specifically referred to in the Regulations, derives from the fact that industrial change and changing production systems affect all sectors and all workers. At any one time, of course, there are sectors which are in the forefront of such changes. Whereas all sectors of the economy are confronted with the same competitive environments, each one has to contend with specific developments. The rates at which structural changes affect the different sectors and economic activities are therefore not the same, and vary in time. The multisectoral horizontal approach combines positively with concentration, which comprises four aspects: concentration in terms of undertakings, beneficiaries, type of action and subject. ____________________ 1 COM(94) 510 3. Objective 4 and the White Papers on Growth, Competitiveness and Employment and European Social Policy In giving priority to investment in human capital, operations supported under Objective 4 are fully in line with the perspectives and priorities set out in the White Paper on Growth, Competitiveness and Employment. Among the priority action areas identified by the Member States in the follow-up to the White Paper, special mention is made of improving education and training systems, reorganising working patterns in companies and improving flexibility in firms and on the labour market, reflecting a convergence between the measures envisaged in the Objective 4 programming operation and the follow-up to the White Paper in the Member States. At European level, social policy has an essential role to play in the process of change. The White Paper on European Social Policy - A Way Forward for the Union seeks to set out the main approaches to action in this area at European Union level in the years to come: while considering social policy to be broader than just employment policy, one of the main priorities of this White Paper is the creation of jobs and investment in high-standard labour. There is positive interaction between operations financed under Objective 4 and LEONARDO, the European Community's action programme on the implementation of a vocational training policy, and the Community's ADAPT initiative. 4. The salient features of the programming documents The measures envisaged with a view to implementing Objective 4 are set against four priorities which are common to the various programming documents: - anticipation of labour market trends and vocational qualification requirements; - vocational training and retraining, guidance and counselling; - improvement and development of appropriate training systems - technical assistance or horizontal measures relating to the CSF as a whole. Within this common framework of priorities the Member States, in partnership with the Commission, have designed a series of measures to implement Objective 4. These measures reflect the general principles of Objective 4 and the specific circumstances in each Member State. Anticipation (between 10 and 33% of the total) This is a question of anticipating labour market trends and needs in terms of skills and qualifications. The aim is to prepare the way for counselling, guidance and worker training measures, as well as back-up and adaptation measures relating to training structures at the appropriate level. Training (between 34 and 52% of the total) The training priority is concerned with the development of the training effort and with guidance and counselling, the aim being to ensure that labour market exclusion is not the lot of the workforce affected by industrial change and changes in organisation systems. These measures are intended to stabilise employment by making it easier for workers to change jobs within undertakings and, where redundancies are unavoidable, by providing workers with qualifications so as to improve their employability in other undertakings and sectors. Improvement of training systems and structures (between 5 and 30% of the total) The improvement of training systems and structures is intended to achieve a balance between the training courses on offer and the needs of the persons concerned. Technical assistance (between 5 and 17% of the total) Technical assistance is particularly important in view of the novel character of Objective 4. 5. Financial aspects The sums available for Objective 4 outside the Objective 1 regions for the Member States concerned were arrived at by a two-stage procedure: - the overall budget available for the CSFs for Objectives 3 and 4 outside the Objective 1 regions was fixed by the Commission on 21 November 1993 at ECU 13.948 million for the period 1994-99 (at constant 1994 prices); - in the programming process for Objectives 3 and 4, each Member State divided up its financial allocation between these Objectives, taking account of the considerations mentioned in the joint declaration by the Council and the Commission on Article 1 of the Framework Regulation. Over the period 1994-99 Objective 4 (outside the Objective 1 regions) accounts for an average of almost 19% of the total budget for Objectives 3 and 4, except in the United Kingdom, which has not yet submitted a plan for Objective 4. An appropriate balance between national and regional public funding, private funding and Community support has been achieved. The ratio, which varies with the Member State and is adjusted in accordance with the priority and the size of the enterprises concerned, is around one-third national and regional public funding, one-third private funding and one- third Community support. 6. Effective partnership - The "bottom-up" approach will be developed in a dynamic manner and will be reflected above all in concrete procedures for designing and selecting projects. - Consultation of the enlarged partnership has taken place in principle in conjunction with the preparation of national plans for Objective 4. Such consultations must be continued and developed throughout the implementation period, taking account of the specific features and institutional practices of the Member States, in such a way as to ensure a broad consensus among all those involved in operations. In this context, the process of effective joint contribution by the social partners should be improved and developed. For its part the Commission will therefore examine, together with the social partners, the most suitable procedures to be adopted at European level in order to achieve this. More specifically, meetings and seminars will be organised at both national and European levels in order to take a more detailed look at the relevant aspects of implementation of Objective 4. Finally, a conference will be organised at European Union level in 1995. * * * * * Welcoming the adoption of the various programming documents relating to Objective 4, Mr Padraig Flynn declared that: "Adoption of these documents is particularly important in that it represents the first stage of implementation of the new Objective 4, which has a dual aim: to help workers adapt to industrial change, and thus to contribute towards boosting the competitiveness of businesses. In implementing the various documents, it will be necessary to consolidate the anticipation aspect, which means paying more attention to the bottom- up approach and ensuring effective contributions by the social partners, at both national and European levels." * * * |
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