madam president honourable members i would like to thank first of all the rapporteur mr <unk> for his report and his constructive approach to the commission proposal on the employment guidelines and i very much agree with him on the need to put these new employment guidelines into the context of the crisis
it is just two years ago since the fall of lehman brothers and two thousand and eight was an in the financial sector two thousand and nine was an for the economy with an unprecedented recession and twenty ten is an for employment in europe with an average unemployment rate of ten and twenty among young people
we really have to take these matters seriously and that is why i very much appreciate the way in which we have been working with parliament in the recent months in the spring period in particular on both the guidelines and the eu twenty twenty strategy
the commission has followed the work on this report very closely
the debate has been extensive and fruitful
the debate has also shown that priorities have to be made and compromises have to be struck
i welcome the excellent cooperation between the committee on employment and social affairs and the commission over the last four months
as i have stressed on several occasions it is of vital importance for the commission to have all the main eu institutions on board and in particular the european parliament in order to establish the necessary political ownership of the new europe twenty twenty strategy and to ensure that europe twenty twenty becomes a success
i can assure you that the commission will be keen to involve parliament as closely as possible in the implementation of the strategy in the coming years
i am pleased to note that a large part of the proposals and amendments put forward in the draft report have been introduced by the council and are included in the text which was given political endorsement by the european council in june
there are a number of outstanding points which will have to be discussed with the council
the commission would not be in favour of the amendments which aim to alter the structure of the guidelines by adding new guidelines
this would undermine the clarity and the coherence of the commission's proposal
the commission is also against the idea of adding more headline targets to the five already agreed at political level
for the commission the fundamental principle in designing the new strategy has been to limit the number of targets and objectives in order to better focus the new strategy
this being so the commission agrees that some issues may need further strengthening in the text for example in relation to childcare decent work or smes
the commission is ready to work with parliament and with the council in order to find a mutually suitable compromise text
