Name: Committee on Employment and Social Affairs Ordinary meeting
Uploaded: 2026-06-02T08:30:00+00:00

00:12 - 01:06

Speaker 2

All right colleagues, we are continuing. We are continuing with the next item on the agenda, which is the consideration of amendments to the draft report on establishing the European Social Fund as part of the national and regional partnership plans set out in the NRPP regulation, establishing conditions for the implementation of the Union support to quality employment, skills and social inclusion for 2028 to 2034. Over 400 amendments have been tabled, highlighting the importance of this subject, and I will start by giving the floor to our co-rapporteurs, Mr. Casa and Mrs. Mai, to comment on these amendments. You're going to, okay, so Mr. Radtke will replace Mr. Casa. I will start with you for the first three minutes.

01:06 - 03:11

Speaker 4

Okay, thank you very much. Yeah, David Casa is, is unfortunately ill, so he asked me to read this out on his behalf. Thank you chair, dear colleagues, Mr. Casa would like firstly to thank everyone who tabled amendments to the ESF. They make important contributions to this fund, and he wants to thank not only the shadows, but also the rapporteurs of the opinion-giving committees and each ample member who made their voice heard. This is a very good base to start negotiating.

On some areas I see that there is a majority for a common approach. I think we all understand the importance of having a strong social fund and this, that this regulation is the best place to design its measures. On other areas Mr. Casa is looking forward to working with you to get closer to each other and to find a position that we can defend as one Parliament. And in fact, the rapporteurs will be doing this this Thursday, where they will have more time than we do today to exchange our views in greater detail. It is important to mention that we are guided by the interim report which sets a budget line for the ESF and calls for a separate and stand-alone programme.

This reflects the consensus from stakeholder at European and national levels. Every organisation we spoke with leading to this moment has stressed how important this is, a strong ESF with clear objectives that provides predictable investments. In our draft report, this is what Marit and Arnold, as in, this is for the conclusion. Do I get the floor second time? Okay, it's for later.

03:11 - 03:15

Speaker 1

Thank you very much, and next Mrs. Mai, the co-rapporteur.

03:15 - 04:56

Speaker 3

Yes, thank you very much chair, and I'd like to echo the words of Mr. Casa as they were pronounced by our colleague Radtke on his behalf. We want to thank all the, all the colleagues for their amendments.

I think we counted almost 500. So we see that most of these amendments, they go into a direction that we also support. The most important element, I think, that we have also stressed in our previous discussion here is that we have a strong standalone ESF, that we have an ESF with a good budget, but also with some clear targets. And I think we are able on the basis of what we have seen from the amendments to work on, oops, to work on these targets. As it goes for the support of our colleagues and also I think on the basis of what we have seen from the civil society organizations, from all the other information that we've had, I think we see that we are going on a good path forward, that we are working on a strong ESF that can help us with the fulfillment of the social targets of the European Social Fund.

And I think it's also important to stress that on this Thursday we will start with our first shadows meeting where we can go a little bit further into depth into the first directions that we will have with each other. So I think so far this was a very good first round of amendments. Thank you very much.

04:56 - 05:07

Speaker 5

Thank you. And then the floor to the shadow rapporteurs, starting Mrs. Verbruggen from the Patriots.

05:07 - 05:26

Speaker 8

Oui, merci. Merci bien, chers collègues, chers rapporteurs. Les choses en fait n'ont pas évolué depuis la dernière fois où nous avons débattu de ce sujet dans cette commission. Donc rien à ajouter sur le fond. La décision de la Conférence des Présidents a été ajournée alors que nous aurions pu être fixés dès maintenant.