Eurochild working paper | Conditional cash transfers and their impact on children – ensuring adequate resources throughout the life cycle from a children’s perspective

Conditional cash transfers (CCTs) in general aim to exert an immediate effect on poverty by raising income, while at the same time contributing to a longer-term reduction of poverty by improving beneficiaries’ future potential to earn a living, in so doing contributing to a drop in demand for such benefits. Within the range of CCTs implemented to date, behaviour related to education, health and nutrition constitute frequent foci, with education and health the most common combination.

2014 EU Alliance investing in Children

EAPN mobilises to get MEPs to sign Written Declaration on Investing in Children

EAPN members are contributing to the the EU Alliance’s efforts to gather signatures of the Written Declaration on Investing in Children from at least half of the Members of the European Parliament (i.e. 376 members) by the 7th December 2015 and to raise public awareness about the campaign. To name a few: in the context of the Cypriot Children’s Week 2015, EAPN Cyprus is organizing an event on 21st November (in co-organisation with the PCCPWC, Pancyprian Coordinating Committee for the Protection and Welfare of Children) when which 6 MEPs from Cyprus will be invited to sign the Declaration; EAPN Estonia, Germany, Portugal, Malta and Netherlands also sent requests for signatures to the MEPs of their countries and/or are raising the visibility of the campaign through their communication channels.  

EuroHealthNet welcomes the report on child poverty adopted by the Employment and Social Affairs Committee of the EP

13/10/2015 – The own-initative report on “Reducing inequalities with a special focus on child poverty”[1] was adopted today by the Employment and Social Affairs Committee of the European Parliament. The report – by rapporteur Inês Cristina Zuber MEP – makes several recommendations that could make a real contribution to reducing child poverty and improving health equity. These recommendations are also in line with the evidence from DRIVERS[2] research, a FP7 project coordinated by EuroHealthNet and with EAPN as one of the main partners.

2014 EU Alliance investing in Children

EU Alliance for Investing in Children | Juncker’s Investment Plan – Investing in social progress, human capital, health and education

Press Statement of the EU Alliance for Investing in Children on the occasion of the European Parliament’s adoption of the European Fund for Strategic Investments

25/06/2015 – The EU Alliance for Investing in Children welcomes the European Parliament’s adoption of the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI) – yesterday during their plenary session in Brussels. MEPs have added important provisions on how the EFSI should be allocated which will ensure long-term strategic investments and societal progress, such as investment in targeted social policies in line with the 2013 Social Investment Package and support of projects in the fields of human capital, culture, education and health. In addition, we welcome the inclusion that the EFSI should contribute to achieving the Europe 2020 targets.However, the Alliance for Investing in Children regrets that investing in education from an early age is no longer explicitly mentioned in the adopted text. There is considerable evidence on the benefits of investing in early childhood education and care for all children for achieving long term results in tackling poverty, exclusion and unemployment.

EAPN speaks at EP Employment Committee Hearing on Zuber ‘child poverty’ report

01/04/2015 – Sian Jones, EAPN Policy Coordinator spoke in the EMPL Committee hearing to prepare the own initiative report: “Reducing inequalities with a special focus on child poverty”, with rapporteur Ines Zuber (GUE). EAPN underlined the importance of giving more priority to the systemic causes of poverty rooted in inequality of distribution of resources – ensuring adequate income through the life cycle through quality jobs and social protection with guaranteed access to key public services financed by tax justice,  rather than blaming parents and focusing only on individual solutions.