Belgian federal and regional governments take joint action against youth unemployment

The Belgian federal government and the governments of the Flemish and Walloon regions have agreed to work together in restructuring the current support policies for unemployed people from 1 January 1999. The various ministers responsible for employment have reached an agreement on the matter. The restructuring is part of the Belgian response to the European Union's Employment Guidelines.

A so-called "support plan" for unemployed people has existed in Belgium since 1992. The central point of the plan has been that the various employment offices should call in for interview after 10 months of unemployment all full-time unemployed people who receive benefits, are less than 46 years old and do not have a secondary education diploma. A detailed action plan (including retraining opportunities) is then drawn up to guide and support the unemployed person in their search for employment. The employment offices evaluate how well unemployed people have adhered to the strategy, and those who refuse to cooperate up to a certain degree can in principle be sanctioned. For the first three months of 1998 (the most recently available figures) the relevant group consisted of 11,635 jobless individuals. About 8,000 of these had a support plan designed for and with them.

The federal government and the regions have cooperated in this strategy, with each financing part of the costs. This has turned out to be a rather delicate issue as the regions are responsible for employment placement and training, whereas the federal government is responsible for any possible sanctions. This means that, de facto, the regions have had to notify the federal services about those unemployed people who show an unwillingness to participate or accept work - notification which has not always taken place. The federal government, on the other hand, has had to refund the regions' expenses, which requires administrative effort and has often resulted in delayed payments. It became clear to all parties concerned that the system suffered from serious malfunctions.

Therefore, following an agreement between the various ministers responsible for employment, the federal government and the governments of the Flemish and Walloon regions have agreed to work together in restructuring the current support policies for unemployed people from 1 January 1999. This restructuring also forms part of the Belgian response to the EU Employment Guidelines (EU9810130F).

Initial reform of the system concerns the target groups of unemployed people. The new target groups will be: those less than 25 years old without lower secondary education; those with lower secondary education as their highest diploma; and those above the age of 25 who have been unemployed for over a year.

The federal government will give priority in expenditure for the plan (about BEF 1 billion) to the first group, who amount to about 7,000 unemployed individuals. They are usually unemployed without yet receiving any benefits. They will be interviewed for a preliminary re-evaluation of their situation after six months' unemployment. They will be guided and directed towards employment or training opportunities. If they participate in a training programme, they will receive a monthly payment of BEF 4,000.

Unemployed workers with a basic secondary education diploma are the second priority. They will receive the same type of initial guidance supplemented with a more specific job-oriented training programme. The federal government will finance these initiatives.

The regions will direct their attention toward the group of those who are over 25 years old and unemployed for more than one year. They will receive intensive coaching in job seeking and specific work-oriented training. The regions will finance this part of the programme.

The Flemish Minister for Employment, Theo Kelchtermans, has launched the idea of creating "employment counters" in each city. All services (federal and regional) involved in the employment programmes would be represented in a "one-stop shop" organisation. The goal is to give unemployed people better and more integrated direction through the labyrinth of employment initiatives, rules and regulations. The federal government, represented by Minister of Employment Miet Smet, has seconded this plan, pledging the full cooperation of the federal services involved.