Call to face IT jobs challenge

Date: 10/07/1997

By Simon Coss

EUROPE needs to rethink its approach to employment policy radically if it is to face up to the challenges posed by the explosion of information technology.

That will be the message from Social Affairs Commissioner Pádraig Flynn in a report due to be unveiled next week in the wake of a year-long study into the impact on Europe of the 'information society'.

Officials close to Flynn are promising that he will not simply summarise information gathered over the past 12 months, but will come forward with some concrete suggestions. “What we will be publishing is a communication, but it will be more 'White Papery' in essence. This will be a policy document,” said one Flynn aide.

In a Green Paper published last July, Flynn's Directorate-General for social affairs (DGV) called on interested parties to send in their observations on the possible social impact of the growth in information technology (IT).

As part of the process, DGV commissioned a high-level group of experts from industry and the academic world to draw up a detailed report outlining possible areas for EU-level legislation. Their report, made public earlier this month, is expected to form the basis of Flynn's proposals.

Next week's communication is likely to warn member states not to view technological development as somehow separate from the development of society as a whole.

This follows warnings from the expert group about the experience of the former Soviet-bloc countries of central and eastern Europe, which “experienced very little growth and development, despite massive investment in science and technology and higher education, in the 20 years before the collapse of the Berlin Wall”.

Flynn is also expected to suggest that EU member states reorientate their education policies towards the idea of life-long learning.

As technology develops at an ever-increasing rate, it will no longer be possible to expect people to acquire all the knowledge and skills they will need at the beginning of their working lives. Education systems will therefore need to be equipped to deal with people of all ages.

Another suggestion put forward by the high-level group and likely to be followed up by Flynn is that of creating a so-called European Learning Agency Network (ELAN).

This pan-European body would aim to coordinate educational developments across the EU to prevent gaps developing between regions at the cutting edge of IT development and those areas lagging behind.

To ensure that the single market continues to function efficiently, the experts also concluded that some form of European-level regulation of the development of the information society would be necessary. They said the Commission's existing powers to ensure free competition in the EU should be extended to cover other IT developments. Flynn is almost certain to endorse these suggestions.

Other important areas which will be addressed include the impact of the information society on working patterns. Traditional EU labour legislation is based on employees working a clearly defined number of hours on premises owned or rented and maintained by their employers.

The growth of practices such as teleworking means such assumptions will need to be reconsidered and new legislation will be necessary to ensure that employees in the information society enjoy similar levels of social protection to those they have now.