FRANCE The

of active labour-market policy, as well as an effective control of the
agreements on targets by the Federal Employment Service.
Finally, as a third step, once the report of the “Commission for the
Reform of Local Finances“ has been submitted, the preconditions
are to be created for the merger of unemployment and social benefit
into a new single uniform payment for all people in work. It is
planned that the ruling will enter into force on 1 January 2004.
GREECE
Developments in the drive to modernise
the OAED
The new Employment Protection Centres
The Greek Manpower Employment Organisation (OAED)’s
current efforts are focused on completing a network of new
Employment Promotion Centres (EPCs). The 117 local
Employment Services involved in applying active and passive
policies throughout Greece are being transformed.
The new model comprises:
1. The existing 117 services distributed throughout the country,
which will offer a range of actions under the social security
system (allowance policy) and some employment actions up to
the full development of the EPCs;
2. The operations of 63 self-contained EPCs throughout Greece,
established in premises adjacent to the local services, which will
provide timely services to citizens with a variety of needs (e.g.
allowances, integration into the labour market). The network is
growing and will be completed in 2004. The 63 Employment
Promotion Centres already in operation provide high quality
services to the unemployed and businesses in terms of
infrastructure, human resources, techniques and advanced tools.
The basic services on offer include counselling, information on
the demand for specialised employees, individual support,
completion of personal action plans, inclusion of the
unemployed in an active employment policy with priority given
to hiring policies, and their position in the production process.
During 2003, the system and tools will be defined to develop an
information and contacts structure for companies, professional
players and other associations under the remit of each EPC, so as
to provide fuller information and boost job creation potential.
The establishment of the new Employment Promotion Centres is
the basic factor in reorganising the OAED. Since the EPCs are
public bodies, an attempt has been made to disentangle them from
certain unwieldy public sector functions. Law 2956/2001 on the
reorganisation of the OAED has been supplemented with new
legislative modifications which will be completed in April 2003 and
which are geared to the flexible administration of the EPCs. The
EPCs combine public and private-sector criteria as regards
methodology, staffing and operations.
To make the EPCs operationally effective, they have been staffed
with 489 expert labour consultants who have undertaken the
exclusive task of advising the unemployed and companies.
One of the main problems faced by the OAED is the statistical
monitoring of unemployment, which is – to a large extent – the
Overall Developments
result of the fact that there is no total information system (TIS). The
OAED’s efforts in the next six months will focus on developing a
basic TIS department that will include registering unemployed
persons, monitoring their development through individual
approach processes, integrating them in active employment policies
and, finally, integrating them into the labour market. The system
will be completed in September 2003 thanks to co-operation
between the OAED, the administrative sector of the EPCs and the
OAED’s subsidiary Erevnitiki-Plirophoriki [Research and
Information Company].
It is worth pointing out that in the last decade, concurrently with the
effort to modernise the OAED, there has been particular emphasis
on designing and applying more efficient employment policies in
both qualitative and quantitative terms. The high unemployment
rate of 11.5% seen in 2000 has currently dropped to around 9.5%;
this is not unrelated to the active measures applied by the OAED.
Nevertheless, pushing the unemployment rate down further and
stabilising it will require additional joint efforts on the part of the
OAED and its subsidiaries, albeit always within the framework of
development and employment policies. It is thought that
implementing a statistical monitoring information system for
market data by the end of 2003 will considerably facilitate the task
of Erevnitiki-Plirophoriki in terms of supply and demand, and will
make the OAED more effective in charting active employment
policies.
IRELAND
Lifelong learning in Ireland
Lifelong learning is a necessary response to the current economic
and social changes taking place in society. It is crucial to have a
knowledge-based society with an ability to continuously acquire
knowledge, skills and competencies in this modern ever-changing
business and working environment. The importance of lifelong
learning has become all the more apparent given current
demographic trends where, throughout Europe, there is a decline in
new entrants to the labour force and a consequent need to rely more
on an existing population of workers. Ireland is now beginning to
experience this trend in substance, with a decline in the numbers
leaving second level education underway and set to increase over the
coming decade.
In addition to the economic imperative, there are a number of social
concerns, which are driving the lifelong learning agenda. Foremost
amongst these is the relationship between employability and social
inclusion, and the view that access to more and better jobs is a
fundamental underpinning of an inclusive society. This view is
supplemented by the belief in the potential of lifelong learning to
promote and develop active citizenship, whereby people are
empowered to contribute proactively to the development of society,
whether through politics, community development, business, or the
arts and sciences. Lifelong learning also brings the issue of
individual personal development to the forefront and supports the
individual’s right to grow and develop intellectually and holistically.
The definition of lifelong learning by the European Commission is
“all learning activity undertaken through-out life, with the aim of
improving knowledge, skills and competences within a personal,
civic, social and/or employment-related perspective”
The European Council and Commission made the recommendation
Spring 2003 | European Employment Observatory Review 15