Kathleen Funchion: Youth Guarantee Must Be Investment, Not Cost
Kathleen Funchion addresses the urgent need for a strong Youth Guarantee to protect young workers and future generations. She warns that moves toward deregulation and militarisation by the Commission threaten quality jobs and workers' rights, and calls for measures including fair wages and an EU directive on psychosocial risks.
Main points: Funchion sets out why the Youth Guarantee and well-designed youth policies should be treated as investments in people rather than budgetary costs. She emphasises fair pay and protections for entry-level staff, trainees and interns who are too often underpaid and overworked.
Threats to job quality: She highlights recent attempts at deregulation and growing militarisation at EU level, arguing these trends have serious consequences for workplace rights and the availability of quality jobs for young people entering the labour market.
Health and cross-policy links: Funchion argues the Youth Guarantee must be linked to health and mental health policy, housing, family transport and regional development to be effective. She proposes stronger cross-policy coordination to support young people's transition to decent work.
Workers' protections and minority rights: The speech calls for an EU directive on psychosocial risks at work and reiterates the need to defend language and other rights for marginalised groups, notably Sámi, Roma and travellers. Funchion seeks cross-group support for these proposals and frames them as long-term investments in the next generation.
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I think also the timing of a report on the Youth Guarantee has never been more crucial. We live in a time where we see a lot more attempts by the Commission towards deregulation and militarisation, and this undoubtedly will have a very serious impact on quality jobs and rights in the workplace, particularly for our young people who are entering the workforce presently and in the coming years. For us, this report is crucial for setting out a positive vision that we will be a beacon for young people and the future generations. The Youth Guarantee and well-designed youth policies are not budget costs but investments in people, and I think we need to start looking at it in that way, that it's an actual investment in the next generation. We believe also that there's a need to recognise the rights of workers and of trainees and interns to be entitled to fair wages and fair play. Far too often, entry-level staff and trainees are taken advantage of, they're underpaid, they're overworked, and I think this is something that really needs to be looked at and taken on board, because unfortunately it happens all too often and probably sometimes in this institution as well. It's also my view that this report should propose an EU directive on psychosocial risks at work. I hope this is something that we can achieve cross-group support on. Generally speaking, we need to nurture stronger links between the Youth Guarantee and other policies such as health, mental health, issues around housing, family transport, regional developments and the rights of marginalised groups, particularly Sámi, Roma and travellers. We need to look at language rights and other areas in this category too.
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