Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-12-15-Speech-5-032"
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"en.20001215.2.5-032"2
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"Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, first of all, I should like on behalf of the Commission to congratulate the rapporteur and the two committees on this report. I am particularly pleased because it shows that the Commission and the European Parliament are to a large extent in agreement and have developed a common understanding of the challenges of ageing. The debate has shown that there is broad agreement on the appropriate political response to this in the fields of employment, social security, health and social integration.
We are certainly facing tremendous challenges. Only a sustained and joint effort can help us to meet them. I think that it is important to preserve a high degree of consensus so that we succeed in adapting to the process of ageing in our society in an appropriate way.
Secondly, I should like to stress the significance of this communication. It is true that the communication contains few specific proposals for measures and initiatives. However, it does offer an innovative diagnosis of the greatest challenges of ageing, out of which emerges an extremely important compilation of suitable political responses, responses to issues relating to employment, social security, health and social integration. Ensuing Commission proposals have adhered rigidly to this roughly sketched out agenda. It will undoubtedly also provide further information about political trends in the future.
Concerns about closing the age gap in Europe's performance balance sheet have been reflected very strongly in the employment process, from the guidelines to the recommendations to the NLP and peer review procedures. They were also plain to see in the plans for the Community initiative EQUAL and in the allocation of ESF funds from 2001 to 2006. What is more, age-related issues are amongst the most important objectives setting the agenda in the new process of cooperation in the field of social protection. In the most recent communications on pensions, the central idea has been "mobilising society's full potential", because raising the employment rate of older people who are fit to work is crucial to providing sustainable pensions in an ageing society. Initiatives in areas such as equal opportunities, equal treatment and social integration are similarly outward signs of aspects of an active ageing scenario. At this stage, I should like to emphasise that the directive on equal treatment in the workplace, which was adopted on 12 October 2000, bans discrimination on the grounds of age.
Future initiatives in the field of public health are directed more at health- and care-related issues in old age and at promoting healthy ageing. Finally, part of the fifth framework programme for research provides for investigations into issues associated with old age, including the effects on health of an active lifestyle in old age. It is therefore clear that the political paradigm of active ageing is reflected in many important initiatives and we can safely assume that it will inspire a raft of further initiatives in the future.
With your permission, I will, in conclusion, respond to a number of points where Parliament has expressed concern about the effects of the measures proposed by the Commission. A constantly recurring concern in your report was whether an emphasis on political measures promoting active and healthy ageing did not necessarily mean poorer conditions and fewer rights for people in need of care, for the very old and for those unfit for work. I should like to give you explicit assurance that this is certainly not the Commission's intention. Quite the opposite: in the communication, the Commission has laid great stress on the assertion that political measures should address the differences between people. Early retirement must remain an option for those who are no longer fit to work. Not everyone can or should retire voluntarily from working life. There must be discretionary powers for individual preferences and decisions. Furthermore, in our view, over-emphasising active political measures has precisely the opposite effect. In fact it is a precondition for our ability to find sufficient resources for those in need of care, so that the wealthy amongst us are willing and able to pay higher contributions and become more independent in old age."@en1
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