Read up on what has been happening this week on our weekly editorial.
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14 July 2011
There are some weeks that are spent doing things and others where the focus is on preparing and planning things. This week has been for the latter. With the team we have been thinking about our advocacy and our events for the coming six months. Look at the events section of this E-news for more information on what is happening. I would like to highlight a few things though. In September we will hold the eagerly awaited Seminar on Fundraising. We are able to do this thanks to a grant received from the Otto Per Mille Fund of the Waldensian Church in Italy. We will have a 4 day training on accessing EU Funding, led by a highly experienced consultant and this training is open to all our members. We have significant possibilities to support your participation in this event thanks to the grant received. An invitation and further information will be sent to all members next week so watch out for this coming your way. We will also have our conference on Volunteering in November and with our colleagues in CEC we will also organise a seminar on Europe 2020 in November. More information will follow on these.
I know that many of you will be heading off on holiday soon so I would just like to wish you all a restful, refreshing and relaxng summer holiday and look forward to seeing many of you in the autumn.
Have a good weekend
Heather
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Stating the obvious in Sopot..and saying Bye Bye in Brussels. |
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5 July 2011
The Polish Presidency had one of its first meetings this week with the informal meeting of Employment Ministers taking place in Sopot, Poland. I had the honour to participate in part of this meeting in my capacity as Vice President of Social Platform. In our interventions my focus was on the social impact of the austerity measures at EU and national level (see last weeks editorial for some thoughts on this) and challenging member states as to why they do not take the Europe 2020 target to reduce poverty by 20 million seriously. These points may seem really obvious to our members who are constantly providing services to the most marginalised in society but it does not seem to be so to Member States. This week I reviewed the National Strategic Reports of each EU country that has a member in Eurodiaconia to see how they are committing to meet this target. It was frankly depressing to see that reducing poverty and social exclusion is essentially regarded as a means to enhance economic growth and labour market participation rather than as a way to ensure equal, just, cohesive and dignified societies and lives. It appears that humans only have worth if they are active in the labour market and all policy seems to be directed to achieving this. We need to bring pressure on the Polish Presidency and the other EU Member States to change their view.
We know that each person is worth much more than their 'working potential' but that each person can contribute to the development of just, socially inclusive and cohesive societies in any number of ways. This year is the European Year for Volunteering and so this years' Eurodiaconia Award looks to celebrate the volunteering projects that encourage the social inclusion of people all over Europe. We have received a number of entries for the Award but we know that there are more projects out there so we have extended the deadline for 2 more weeks till the 20th July so we can have more projects to consider for the Award and showcase in an exhibition in the European Parliament later this year. Details of the Award have been emailed to all member contacts and volunteering contacts and you can find more information on the front page of our website.
This past week has seen a few changes in our office. Clotilde Clark Foulquier rejoined us on Monday after her maternity leave - we are very pleased to have her back and I am sure she will be in touch with many of you soon to follow up on the work on social exclusion and poverty. Sadly we said goodbye to Lisebeth Dhont who has been with us since January doing an internship. Liesbeth was responsible for a lot of the work we have done recently on Social Economy, volunteering and indicators of well being. She has now joined the women's section of a Belgian political party as a policy officer and we wish her all the best. Krista Salminen, who has been with us since January as a Policy Assistant also leaves us next week. Krista has been working a lot on ageing and inter - generational solidarity, on the European Platform Against Poverty and the social impact of the financial and economic crisis - we wish her all the best for the future as well. We have been very privileged to have Krista and Liesbeth with us for the past six months and we thank them for their enthusiasm and their hard work.
Have a good weekend, hopefully in the sun!
Heather
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30 June 2011
Yesterday, the European Commission presented the proposed budget for the EU for 2014 - 2020. This budget, known as the Multi-Annual Financial Framework (MFF) should in theory be shaped by the political priorities of the European Union and as such, should reflect the concerns of the Europe 2020 strategy. At first glance it seems promising. The largest budget heading is Smart and Inclusive Growth yet in the explanation to the budget the focus is once again on growth rather than inclusion - but we also need to take time to look more closely at the detail of the budget before making final judgements. Yet we know that some member states are already against the proposed budget, claiming it is too high and that in these times of austerity it is not possible for member states to contribute so much to the EU. So, if the budget is to be reduced where will the cuts be made? If it is anything like the austerity measures in member states it will be the social sector, in other words, the inclusive growth element, that could be under threat. We just need to see the situation in Greece this week to see how damaging austerity measures can be. Increased taxation, lack of jobs and sense of complete hopelessness and anger - no wonder people are taking to the streets. Austerity measures are choices - and we need to question the choices that are being made that damage the fundamental rights of all people to live in dignity and with their basic needs met. The European Union has a responsibility to protect those rights though the Lisbon Treaty but at the same time develops these austerity measures to protect the Euro Zone. The new EU budget cannot be subject to 'austerity measures' and we will need to follow this process carefully to ensure that there will still be sufficient money at EU level to support the eradication of povety and social exclusion as well as the provision of quality social services in Member States so that the Europe 2020 targets can be met.
This week we saw how much financial support is needed to ensure that the social rights of the Roma people are met through our participation in a Dialogue Seminar organised by CEC and COMECE. This week we also saw how much investment is needed to ensure that older people in Europe received appropriate care and support when our Healthy Aging and Elderly Care Network met for the first time and we also saw how young people need crucial support to get into their first jobs as we participated in an external seminar. These are just some of the needs of people in Europe today and our members, who work with these people and many others every day, know that reducing funding for essential services or making funds too difficult to apply for will have long term effects. Our members keep going though, keep trying to provide high quality services and keep trying to change the systems that create exclusion and poverty. Thank you.
Have a great weekend
Heather
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A short overview of this week |
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23 June 2011
I mentioned last week that I was going to Lisbon for the General Assembly of the EAPN. While much of the meeting was taken up with discussion on the future structure of EAPN there was also unanimous agreement on the final declaration of the Assembly, calling for a complete rethink on economic policies across Europe. You can read the final declaration later in this Enews. It was a very timely declaration as this week the Heads of State meet as the European Council to endorse the European Commission recommendations on the national reform programmes. As we have said before, reform is fine, but it must not come at the expense of people and their social situation. Therefore Eurodiaconia has written to the Heads of State and asked them to rethink their approach and to ensure that the social impact of any reform policies is considered. You can read our letter here.
This week we also had our first meeting of the Marginalisation and Exclusion Network where we focused on homelessness and destitution. With key input from FEANTSA, we looked at different strategies to address homelessness in different countries and the challenges faced with increasing intra EU migration, growing personal debt and multiple social and health needs. There is alot still to do on this topic and we plan to work more closely with FEANTSA in future to press for a clear EU strategy to address homelessness in Europe. Keep an eye on future editorials for more info..
Have a good weekend
Heather
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16 June 2011
Just a short message this week as I am about to head off to Portugal for the General Assembly of the European Anti Poverty Network. It is quite a significant meeting as they will agree a new strategic plan and organisational structure - a little like we did last year. All organisations go through change and are affected by change so we have to constantly adapt our structures and ways of work. As you know, one of the things we have done in Eurodiaconia has been to develop the system of networks where more members can participate. Next week we will have the first meeting of the Marginalisation and Exclusion Network so I will tell you next week how it all went. We are also trying to support members in more specific ways and last week Catherine was in Warsaw to meet with our Polish members to see how we can support them to interact with the forthcoming Polish EU presidency. However, Poland has not yet identified any major social policy goals for their presidency which means we have to think more about what what we want to promote rather than react to. This week Laura has been in Helsinki, co-leading the common project on community engagement with interdiac. She will give you a report on this next week.
I also want to share with you that we have a new member of staff in our office. Hélène Konopski has joined us as Finance Officer. She will work one day a week taking care of all our accounting and financial matters. I am sure that most of our members will come into contact with her at some point and she is looking forward to getting to know our organisation. You can contact her in the usual way helene.konopski at eurodiaconia.org.
Have a good weekend
Heather
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Saturday, May 18, 2013
