Europeans ‘fail’ to seize IT job opportunities

Date: 06/01/2000

By Simon Coss

EUROPEANS are still not making the most of the new job opportunities offered by the recent explosion in information technology, warns the European Commission in a report due out later this month.

The report on Strategies for jobs in the information society will examine ways of ensuring more European citizens become fully 'e-literate'.

"We will be looking at issues like improving training for people who still need to develop their IT skills and ensuring all schools within the Union are properly equipped with computers," explained an aide to Social Affairs Commissioner Anna Diamontopoulou.

Officials say they hope to promote the idea of integrating computer use into all areas of the school curriculum. At present, many educational establishments tend to 'ghettoise' IT education by running classes dedicated solely to computing while ignoring new technology in other subject areas.

The report will also touch on the complex question of how to apply the Union's tough health and safety rules to the increasing number of Europeans who use IT to work from home.

While 'telework' has been hailed by many as a godsend which has allowed millions of people to strike a better balance between their private and professional lives, it does have a down side.

Some employees organisations have, for example, expressed concern that it is almost impossible to check on the working conditions of people who carry out their professional activities at home.

Commission officials stress that the institution will not be putting forward formal proposals for regulating telework at this stage, but will instead try to feed ideas into the debate over how new working practices should be controlled in Europe. "We want to encourage telework and other flexible working practices without setting off a rush to the bottom," said one.

The new report will mark the next step in the Commission's ongoing crusade to create a credible EU 'employment strategy' - a quest it has been pursuing with missionary zeal since the special Union jobs summit in Luxembourg at the end of 1997 - and will complement a communication unveiled by Commission President Romano Prodi last month on 'e-Europe'.

EU governments first asked the institution to look into the specific issue of IT and employment at the December 1998 EU summit in Vienna. The outgoing Finnish presidency also attached particular importance to the role which IT can play in reducing Europe's stubbornly high levels of joblessness and Portugal plans to focus attention on the issue at a special summit in Lisbon in March.

Europeans are still not making the most of the new job opportunities offered by the recent explosion in information technology, warns the European Commission in a report due out in January 2000. The report on 'Strategies for jobs in the information society' will examine ways of ensuring more European citizens become fully 'e-literate'.