Category Archives: News and publications

2015 Human rights as an answer to the social damage of the crisis

07-08/05/2015 – EAPN spoke in Alliances to Fight Poverty/ Re-InVEST Seminar, May 7-8, Madrid. How can we make Europe more social, democratic and sustainable? How useful are existing instruments, like the Annual Growth Survey, the European Semester, the Juncker investment plan? Secondly, are human rights an useful tool? And how must they be implemented? The seminar was delivered as part of the new Re-INVEST project, financed by Horizon 2020, aiming to reframe the social investment approach as a strategy to humanize Europe.

EAPN takes part in Euranetplus debate on “do we need minimum wages in the European Union?”

06/05/2015 – EMIN (Anne Van Lancker) and EAPN (Fintan Farrell) took part in radio debate on minimum wages in Europe with several MEPs and EESC officials. It was an opportunity to say that not only is a minimum wage important but the level that the minimum wages is set at is also key and that the EU needs to play a  role to ensure an upwards convergence in the levels of minimum wage to ensure that all people in employment can have access to decent pay as part of quality jobs.

EAPN presents its Assessment of CSRs and European Semester, and proposals on the New Commission Integrated Guidelines at Social Protection Committee

06/05/2015 – EAPN President Sérgio Aires is presenting today at the Social Protection Committee EAPN’s Assessment Report and proposals on CSRs based on national inputs. Mr Aires highlighted the need to rebalance the European Semester and economic governance to ensure economic priorities support social objectives and deliver on the poverty and other social targets of Europe 2020. Effective stakeholder dialogue at national level is also crucial to restore credibility and better policies. EAPN also presented its proposals on the New European Commission Integrated Guidelines in the economic and employment areas with a strong message aiming to make progress on Europe 2020 and invest in people for a fairer EU.

EAPN welcomes new Social Platform Management Committee members

EAPN welcomes the election of its Director Barbara Helfferich as Vice-President of the Social Platform and congratulates all new Management Committee members; Eurochild Director Jana Hainsworth (President), AGE Platform Director Maciej Kucharczyk (Vice-President), PICUM Director Michele Levoy, European Youth Forum Secretary General Allan Pall (Treasurer), John Dolan and Borbala Juhasz.
Looking forward to keep working together for a more ‪#‎social‬ and democratic ‪#‎Europe‬!

EAPN participates in ACCA/Living Wage Foundation Roundtable

27/04/2015 – EAPN participated in a round table on Global perspectives on the living wage. It was organized by ACCA (the association of Chartered Certified Accountants) and the Living Wage Foundation, which works closely with EAPN Scotland – Poverty Alliance. The round table presented the living wage concept and campaign, making the business, economic and social case, based on the successful campaign in UK with 1500 employers already signed up.

Universal Access to Health: One year after the elections

05/04/2015 – EAPN participated in a roundtable organized by health stakeholders including EGA, European Patient’s Forum, Doctors of the World and backed by EP Interest group, to discuss how to press for universal access to health, in a context where ‘efficiency’ dominates. Alojz Peterle (EPP) underlined the need to make the economic case for health, and to defend health investment and promotion, including proposals for a European Semester for health.

DELIVER the “Maternity leave Directive”!

27/04/2015 – EAPN, with the European Women’s Lobby (EWL), the European delegation of Make Mothers Matter (MMM), ILGA Europe, Social Platform, the European Youth Forum, the European Federation of Nurses (EFN) the European Disability Forum (EDF), the Confederation of Family Organisations in the European Union (COFACE) and SOLIDAR, representing millions of women and men throughout Europe are deeply concerned about the negative impact of the withdrawal of the proposal to strengthen the Maternity Leave would have on women throughout Europe. They have addressed today a joint letter to Vice-President of the European Commission Frans Timmermans to maintain the “Maternity leave Directive”. Please sign the petition “Time to Deliver the Maternity Leave Directive”!

Fighting poverty ranks low in European Commission’s priorities

EAPN Europe writes to European Commission’s President Jean-Claude Juncker to stress its concern on Mid-Term Review delay

21/04/2015 – European Commission’s Mid-Term review of the Europe 2020 Strategy publicised and agreed by all parties has been delayed till the end of this year. EAPN Europe considers this shows the lack of serious commitment and low priority the EC gives to the process and fight against poverty. Europe 2020 aims at reducing poverty in at least 20 million by 2020 and was set as a key priority for the new Commission in order to set a smart, sustainable and inclusive recovery from the financial crisis. The number of people experiencing direct poverty has increased in six million after the strategy Europe 2020 was put in place.