On Monday, 23 February, Ināra Mūrniece, Speaker of the Saeima, addressed representatives from the parliaments of all the EU member states who had gathered in the Saeima to discuss social affairs. In her opening address, the Speaker emphasised that social maturity is revealed by society’s attitude towards the most vulnerable groups and that the EU member states must join their efforts in finding new and effective ways of including socially vulnerable people in both social life and the labour market.
Today the Saeima is hosting the Meeting of the Chairpersons of the Committees on Employment and Social Affairs, which is one of the events of the Parliamentary Dimension of the Latvian Presidency of the Council of the European Union.
Among the social challenges that Europe is currently facing, Speaker Mūrniece mentioned the need to promote youth employment and to reduce long-term unemployment, since nearly half of all the unemployed are jobless for an extended period of time. In this context, Mūrniece welcomed the European Commission’s Youth Guarantee initiative, which is an investment in human capital that focuses on 15-24-year-olds and offers work placement, training or internship within four months of registering with the employment service. The Youth Guarantee initiative also supports programmes aimed at other age groups. The Speaker also emphasised that joint efforts should be made to find new ways of attaining the set social objectives, such as social entrepreneurship. Latvia is currently working on the legal framework for social entrepreneurship, and employers are increasingly taking into account the social dimension of the economy.
The Speaker pointed out that the Latvian Presidency has defined an engaged Europe as one of its priorities; therefore, Latvia is working on creating an inclusive and sustainable labour market while developing long-term solutions for promoting employment.
In conclusion, Mūrniece declared that promotion of employment is a task that transcends national borders and should be addressed as a pan-European challenge.
Saeima Press Service