00:00:00 Intro
00:00:31 Mary McCaughey
Welcome to today's edition of Eurofound Talks, Eurofound’s podcast series. I'm delighted today that we are joined by European Commissioner Nicolas Schmit, who is European Commissioner for Jobs and Social Rights. He is visiting here in Dublin over the last two days and we are delighted that he was able to spend some time with us going through the key issues and critical challenges facing the European Union. Welcome, Commissioner.
00:00:58 Nicolas Schmit
Thank you.
00:01:00 Mary McCaughey
Commissioner, we're working in a very difficult situation at the moment. We have challenges that have been facing us already with the pandemic, with the great recession. Now we have Ukraine. We had a process of convergence under way, but it seems to have stuttered to a halt a little bit during the last period of time. Now we're looking at this further crisis. What do you think that the Commission, the European Union, can do to try and embed the policies that will ensure continued upward convergence at this time?
00:01:36 Nicolas Schmit
You referred to the situation in Ukraine and it is a tragedy. What’s happening there is really shocking. The reaction of the European Union as of the international community is very strong and Europe has shown a very strong solidarity, which is a very important point. I wouldn't be too pessimistic because we were on a very strong recovery path, the economy is going well after the COVID crisis. You also hear of strong European policies like SURE and NextGenerationEU. We expected and we see strong evolutions on the labour market, in that unemployment has gone down, including youth unemployment. These are positive signals. Certainly there is a major uncertainty coming through because of this political crisis and we have to be very keen on avoiding that this political crisis destroys what we have achieved during the last months on the recovery. Certainly there is an issue: inflation is higher, energy prices are higher. We are working on these issues, on the social impact of inflation in general and especially energy prices. Now we need very active policies in many fields. We have to accelerate the change in our energy policy: our dependency on fossil energy shows our vulnerability. This is also a good reason to invest in renewables and to accelerate this transition.
00:03:47 Mary McCaughey
The bounce back that we were beginning to see after the COVID crisis or in the recovery was very reassuring. But we did see that the pandemic had an impact. Everyone suffered to some degree. Our research at Eurofound showed that the impact on young people, on women, on those further from the labour market, had devastating implications for their lives and their work. What do you think is your key priority to try and address the inequalities that have emerged during that crisis?
00:04:21 Nicolas Schmit
You have mentioned young people, you have mentioned also those who are in precarious jobs, jobs with not so good working conditions have suffered a lot. The care sector has been under high pressure, as well as first-line or frontline workers. We have to show them that it was not only about applauding them; we have to reflect on revaluing certain jobs. That's why we are proposing this framework for minimum wages. We are also proposing better working conditions, better protections, for instance the latest agreement on the Directive to improve health and safety at work. We have included specifically a part on nurses, on protecting them because they handle very dangerous substances. So there are a lot of concrete measures. Young people certainly are at the centre; by the way, it's the European Year of Youth. It's not just a nice year, it's a year where we have to deliver policies which support young people in skilling, in education, especially also supporting the most vulnerable young people. That's why we changed the Youth Guarantee for young people who are excluded from school, from education, but also from the job market, these are now priorities we have to deal with very strongly.
00:06:05 Mary McCaughey
What about women? Even in terms of the positives, in terms of telework, in terms of the rise in the ability to work more easily between home life and the office. That's seen as a good thing, but we see that this could exacerbate the inequalities that women are already facing in terms of work-life balance, in terms of the care dimension. What can we do to address that and prevent the progress we see in gender equality from taking a step backwards?
00:06:36 Nicolas Schmit
This Commission is a Commission of equality, especially equality between women and men. We have made a proposal on the unfortunately still existing gaps on wages between women and men. We have proposed the Pay Transparency Directive, which hopefully will change the situation. I think we have to work on equality in the world of work, which is still not guaranteed, also in terms of promotion, in terms of combining working at home and on the job. I think this is something which is in our society and we need to work on way different roles are assigned to women and men. This is not an easy task because it's solidly established. But this is not a reason why we should not try to change it.
Work-life balance and equality and very important. For instance we have parental leave, which is always thought of as being for women. No, it's for mothers and fathers and it should be equally distributed between them because very often women suffer as they take the parental leave, and they face the difficulties afterwards when they want to return to their job.
Childcare is central. The Commission will make new proposals on childcare to revise the famous Barcelona targets. Childcare has to be affordable, which is very important, and of good quality. This is an investment in the future. This is an investment in the higher participation of women in the labour market and in the well-being of children. These are some of the issues where we try to promote this equality between women and men, which is for me the fundamental equality we have to have in our society.
00:08:53 Mary McCaughey
Of course, all of that takes place within the context of the gender equality strategy and the pillar of social rights, which are fundamental.
00:09:00 Nicolas Schmit
Principle number two is about gender equality.
00:09:05 Mary McCaughey
Coming back to the changing world of work, things have changed so much, so quickly. We saw developments in terms new forms of employment, such as platform work. I know that you have an initiative on the table that's looking to seek to address the concerns of the platform work sector. What do you think that will actually deliver in terms of addressing the potential inequalities that will emerge there, with a different type of work but also different types of workers?
00:09:37 Nicolas Schmit
Technology has gone very fast, especially now, and this transformation has been accelerated through the pandemic. It is absolutely indispensable to adjust our legal frameworks to this evolution. We have seen a lot of platform workers, but not only platform workers, who have been in working conditions which are more akin to the 19th century than the 21st and this is unacceptable. It is important, on one hand, to take the advantage of these technological developments and new business models, but it cannot be that these new business models develop outside social rights, labour rights and respect for people. It has to be human-centred; it has to respect people's lives; it has to allow decent working conditions and decent salaries, and not just pretend that everybody is his or her own boss, but without any social guarantee. That's the objective of the Platform Directive. There is one important issue we have to work on, namely algorithmic management. We have done it in the Platform Directive, but this is not enough because we are getting into new forms of surveillance of people, especially for remote work. The algorithms are increasingly becoming the instruments for this surveillance. This a field where we have to reflect and implement the right rules on how algorithms can be used in the world of work, especially with the development of remote working.
00:11:43 Mary McCaughey
Of course, that's very important with respect to the elements which are relevant to digital transition. But there's a parallel transition, which is climate change and the green transition. I heard you quote recently Vice-President Timmermans saying that without a just transition, there is just no transition. What do you think needs to be done to ensure that there is a fair and inclusive transition when it comes to climate change that actually does not leave anyone behind?
00:12:18 Nicolas Schmit
I think we insisted a lot when the programmes on the 'fit for 55' package were worked out and presented, as well as the European Climate Law, all these things are absolutely necessary. Climate change is a major threat. There are other threats we are experiencing now, but climate change is a real threat which is part of our reality and we have to do something. But it's not just about developing policies on energy, on buildings, on mobility and so on. We have to take account of the social dimension. Therefore, the Commission has proposed a recommendation to Member States to address all these social issues, from employment to also the impact on the cost of living, especially energy poverty, in this context of fast-increasing energy prices. There is a proposal on a Social Climate Fund, which should activate not only investments but also support for people who are suffering from different aspects of this transformation.
There is a regional aspect which is very important because some regions will suffer more than others, for instance because coal mines will have to close at one stage. We cannot just say on the global balance we have created more jobs than have been lost, we have to look at those who have lost their jobs and where they live, and give solutions for their territories, their local communities. This is how we can ensure that during this transition, which is important and will benefit all of us, we leave nobody behind.
00:14:35 Mary McCaughey
That feeds into the big challenges and the big topics that are going to be discussed at the final session of the Conference on the Future of Europe. In fact, we had one of the key panels of discussion which took place here in Dublin, and one of the recommendations there was on minimum wage. I'm wondering how can that conference actually play into the hopes, optimism, confidence and trust of young people in particular, who still maintain a very high level of trust in EU institutions. How can that actually respond to their aspirations and expectations of policymakers across the EU?
00:15:17 Nicolas Schmit
It is an interesting coincidence that this conference associating European citizens happens at a moment where Europe is in a way under threat, where our values are under threat, and finally where this threat is creating a very solid solidarity. Now is the right moment to listen to citizens and their concerns. We always said ‘we have to bring the European Union closer to citizens’. Now is a fantastic opportunity to do it because citizens are now European citizens all over the European Union. They feel that they are Europeans, with their values, and that these values are not a given forever, they can be threatened. This is a good moment to rebuild or strengthen trust in the European project and to make it a citizens’ project. That’s what I hope this Conference on the Future of Europe and its debates show that the social aspect is very important for people, especially young people. If we lose the young as supporters of Europe, then Europe has no future. I get the feeling that now the young know what the challenges are, what is really at stake. Therefore, we have to respond to their concerns. In that sense I’m optimistic for Europe, optimistic about strengthening the European Union and its capacity to respond to what citizens expect from us.
00:17:21 Mary McCaughey
What's interesting is that we talk of a Europe for the citizen, but sometimes the gap between the citizen and the policymaker or the institutions can be quite wide. How does it motivate you into managing this process to the end?
00:17:37 Nicolas Schmit
First, my personal history, which is not important, but nevertheless is there. I come from a family which really suffered during the Second World War. In my family, from my father's side, I heard what war is. For that reason, I'm very moved by what's happening in Ukraine. At the same time, I think that Europe is an absolute necessity. We really have to work for that Europe, and we cannot work for that Europe in an abstract way. We have to build strong policies, not only but especially in the social sphere. When I became a commissioner, I always heard that Social was not a real competence of Europe. Not only is it wrong to say that, but also if it weren't a competence, we really should create it. But there is a competence there. What moves me is what happens in our society to build better societies, more cohesive and coherent societies. The promise of Europe at the beginning, after the war, was shared prosperity for all: peace and shared prosperity. We thought that peace was not an issue anymore. Peace has come back as a major issue, unfortunately. Shared prosperity is an issue. Inequalities, as you mentioned, people who find it difficult to make ends meet, to have a good job, who fear for their kids and think that their kids are in a worse situation than they have been. This is moving because I believe in Europe, I believe in its values, I believe in a fair society. We try to find the right ways to achieve this: minimum wages, better working conditions, better democracy also at all levels, including in the economy. That's what moves me.
00:19:44 Mary McCaughey
Thank you, Commissioner, that's very inspiring. Just to wrap up here, we always ask our guests to really pare it back. You have a vast remit and your ambition is clearly huge for Europe and for the citizen in the social dimension, but if I asked you to talk to me in three, what would be your key three priorities that you would like to see delivered before the end of your mandate?
00:20:13 Nicolas Schmit
Certainly, I hope that we can deliver on the minimum wage because it's only a part of fighting inequality and establishing dignity of work. The dignity of work is essential in our society, fighting poverty and the dignity of work.
The second is this Platform Work Directive, because it's an important beginning in creating the right responses, social responses for new economic models in the gig economy, the digital economy. We have to make sure that this new economy, which I believe in and which I do not put into question, also respects the social values which have been built up over many decades. We should not return to the beginning of the first industrial revolution, and now we are in the third or fourth industrial revolution. We need these social instruments and the Platform Directive is an important first step.
My third point is more general. I have inherited the Social Pillar and I'm very glad that this Commission and President von der Leyen has taken up this pillar. We have presented an action plan and we have made Social an important dimension of European policies. We need this social dimension in our economic governance and I would like to anchor that in the work of Europe also for the coming years. That's what we have done through the Social Pillar Action Plan, but our work is not over. We are discussing the Semester and economic governance and I don’t want Social to return to what it had been during darker periods, which are not so far away. This is what I would like to achieve.
00:22:22 Mary McCaughey
Thank you very much, Commissioner, it has been an inspiring and enlightening conversation today and over the last few days. Thank you very much and thanks to our listeners. As always, feel free to comment or question anything you've heard online today at #EurofoundTalks. You can also find all our current upcoming research and findings and all the rest of our work on our website. Follow us on our social media channels and until next time, when Eurofound talks to you.
00:22:54 Outro
