Web of the European Alliance for Families
Update n° 2 - 3 December 2007
Reminder
This is the second information paper related to the work progress in the framework of the European Alliance for Families. The first one was presented on 15th June 2007.
Second meeting of the Expert group
On 26th November, 27 government experts representing from the Member States met in Brussels to evaluate the progress of the Alliance. There is not a lot of information available on the meeting’s outcome. We hope that the report will soon be available.
What we know nevertheless is that:
The web portal of the Alliance is operational and will be administered and regularly updated by ESIP (European Social Insurance Platform) during one year at least. COFACE was approached by ESIP to participate in the steering group of this site in order to give our opinion on the content, orientation, …
The European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions (Eurofound) in Dublin is confirmed in its mission to set up and coordinate the Observatory of Good Practices in Family Policies. There is however a problem with the financing of the Observatory which has to be resolved before launching the action. DG Budget of the Commission does not want to increase the expenditure for exterior agencies over the amount fixed for 2007. This means that the Observatory can move ahead only by taking advantage of existing budget headings, which is obviously not simple, because it might harm other party’s interests. This is the situation at the moment… At any rate, additional funds will be hopefully granted for 2008 (see also point 3).
The Second Demographic Forum will take place in Brussels on 24-25 November 2008: a Task Force set up by a few voluntary Member States will prepare the event during the coming months. Moreover there will be a communication of the Commission on the Barcelona objectives regarding childcare to be published in September 2008. Furthermore the Directive on parental leave (1996) is currently being evaluated before a revision process in 2008 with partnership of COFACE.
The list of government experts will soon be available.
Seminar on mutual learning tools for more family-friendly policies and better childcare provision
Held in Brussels on 28th November the seminar was co-organized by the European Commission, Eurofound and OECD. Among the interesting points that were presented, the OECD “Family” database is especially worth mentioning. It gathers the most important statistic data in order to give a comparative vision of family policy measures in the Member States (day-care and pre-schools take up; financial contributions; family composition; child poverty;…). The Synthesis of Findings under the OECD action « Babies and Bosses » is available as from 29 November for 13 countries, including 8 EU Member States (www.oecd.org/els/social/family). All data are available on the web page.
Moreover in the framework of the Observatory (when in operation) the representatives of the Foundation intend to publish 2 reports and 2 case studies annually on family policy issues. The reports would contain comparative analysis between the 27 Member States. The case studies would present best practices including a critical approach.
In the early afternoon, we heard an interesting speech of Ms. Mary Daly from Queen’s University of Belfast, who has notably referred to the following points. There is a need for family oriented policy, because it is the family that represents the important resources for Europe, for example in the matter of taking care of its members. There is therefore scope for adopting family perspective (for example according to life cycle), for giving policies more family friendly orientation (better support for parents), for improving the value and the function of families, for approaching fertility as a socio-economic question (improve the sharing of the cost of children, after more opportunities of choice to people, developing confidence in secured future).
The speech was followed by panel discussion. The President of COFACE, Yves Roland-Gosselin, expressed his satisfaction with the excellent presentations and he recalled his priorities insisting on necessity of creating a baby-friendly environment, letting parents however the free choice of having as many children as they wish to have. He emphasized the three fundamental aspects of family policy mentioned in the recent Communication of the Commission on Solidarity between the Generations: financial resources, services and time. He concluded agreeing with Mary Daly about the necessity of creating a general feeling of confidence in the future.
Summarizing the day, Robert Anderson from Eurofound repeated the need for a global approach towards family policy throughout the whole life cycle and he announced that before Christmas 2007 there will be three documents published on the quality of family life, the reconciliation of family and professional life and the housing of migrant families. He also announced a concept paper on the Observatory of Good Practices in Family Policies.
Finally, when thanking the speakers and participants, Ralph Jacob, Head of Unit in the European Commission, insisted on the importance of exchanging good practices in the framework of Alliance, both at European as well as at national, regional and local levels, this first seminar launched the movement.
Some hundred persons participated in the meeting, including 8 COFACE members from the Belgium, Finland, France, Greece and Ireland.
