Territorial Employment Pacts in Austria

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as instruments to improve local governance and
the integration of civil society
Poznan, 14 November 2005
Lecture at the Poznan University of Economics
Anette Scoppetta
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Whos talking?

• Anette Scoppetta
• _ Head of Co-ordination Unit for Austrian
  Territorial Employment Pacts and Co-ordination
  of OECD LEED Forum on Partnerships and Local
  Governance
• _ Expert for Austrian and European labour market
  issues (especially partnerships)
• _ Head of Unit Work Equal Opportunities at
  the Centre for Social Innovation - ZSI, Vienna

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Contents

• _ Part I European Employment Policy
• _ Part II The Austrian labour market
• _ Part III The Austrian Territorial Employment
  Pacts (TEPs)
• _ Part IV Partnerships as important instrument
  in countries policies
• _ Part V The OECD LEED Forum mission, strategy
  and tasks

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_ Part I

• European Employment Policy

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European Employment Strategy (EES)

• Lisbon European Council (March 2000) the new
  strategic goal for the European Union for the
  next decade was set
• to become the most competitive and dynamic
  knowledge-based economy in the world, capable of
  sustainable economic growth with more and
  better jobs and greater social cohesion.
• The strategy was designed to enable the Union to
  regain the conditions for full employment and to
  strengthen cohesion by 2010. The Council also
  considered that the overall aim of these measures
  should be to raise the overall EU employment rate
  to 70 and to increase the number of women in
  employment from an average to more than 60 by
  2010.

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The Co-ordination at EU Level

• The new EES (revision in 2005) covers a three
  year period, from 2005 to 2008. Its components
  are
• _ Integrated Employment Guidelines guidelines
  setting out common priorities for Member States'
  employment policies
• _ National Reform Programmes every Member State
  draws up a programme _ Joint Employment Report
  is formed by the annual progress report
• _ Recommendations country-specific
  recommendations are issued
• _ EU annual progress report annual assessment to
  revise the Community Lisbon Programme

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The Employment Guidelines (2005-2008)

• The new Employment Guidelines are streamlined.
  Numbering eight they fit within three priorities
  
• _ attract and retain more people in employment,
  increase labour supply and modernise social
  protection systems
• _ improve adaptability of workers and
  enterprises
• _ increase investment in human capital through
  better education and skills.
• The Guidelines proposed by the Commission and
  approved by the Council, present common
  priorities to the Member States national
  employment policies. From 2005, the employment
  guidelines are integrated with the macroeconomic
  and microeconomic policies and are set for a
  three year period.

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Part II

• The Austrian labour market

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Austrian labour market objectives

• ? Full employment
• ? Increasing female employment rate to 65 in
  2005
• ? Increase of older workers
• ? Reduce the average unemployment spell to 90
  days
• ? Strengthen the economic basis by increasing the
  share of RD (From 2,19 of GDP in 2003 to 3
  in 2010) and increase the rate of
  self-employment
• (Source EC, Joint Employment Report 2004-2005)

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Austrian Labour market context

• GDP per capita (2004) 25.844
• (in comparison Poland 9.908, UK 24.440,
  EU-25 22.211)
• Employment rate (overall) 69,0
• Employment rate (women) 61,7
• Unemployment rate (2003) 4,3
• (in comparison Poland 20, UK 4,9, EU-25
  between 2 to 31,8)
• LTU rate 1,2
• Youth Unemployment ratio (2003) 4
• (Source EC, Joint Employment report 2004-2005
  Addendum - 1)

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Labour market policy characteristics

• _ High labour market dynamics (every second
  employment relationship was started or
  terminated)
• _ An average of 774,200 individuals was effected
  1,5 times by unemployment
• _ Regional diversity (2004 82,025 registered
  unemployed in Vienna 7978 in Burgenland)
• _ Seasonal unemployment in the construction
  sector and in tourism
• _ persistent shift towards service jobs (71 of
  all dependent workers have jobs in this sector)
• (Source BMWA, 2003, Labour Market Policy in
  Austria 2003 and Statistic Austria, figures refer
  to 2003 if not indicated differently)

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Major Austrian Labour market challenges

• _ Reform Austrias transfer system (reduce
  barriers to labour force participation)
• _ Remove gender pay gap (still one of the
  highest in EU)
• _ Increase employment rate for older workers
  (strategy on active ageing) and for youth
• _ Increase participation of adults in education
  and training, invest in human capital and
  lifelong learning

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in comparison Poland

• Recommendations
• _ increasing adaptability of workers and
  enterprises, e.g. measures to support
  entrepreneurship, reduce labour costs for
  low-skilled and the young, social partners
  having a key role
• _ attracting more people to labour market, e.g.
  build up effective partnerships at local level
  to develop active labour market policies, reform
  benefit system
• _ investing in human capital, e.g. develop life
  long learning strategy
• (Source EC, Recommendations 2004)

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Part III

• The Austrian
• Territorial Employment Pacts (TEPs)

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The Austrian TEP rationale
Labour market challenges exist, which can not be
met by just a few institutions on their own _
e.g. concentration of unemployment on certain
groups of persons _ e.g. gender segregation on
the labour market _ e.g. shifts between
industries, economic sectors and regions as a
result of developments, in the business and
technology areas in particular
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TEP Definition
What is a Territorial Employment
Pact? Territorial Employment Pacts (TEPs) are
contracted regional partnerships to better link
employment policy with other policies in order to
improve the employment situation on regional and
local level.
The support structure is being offered within the
framework of the structural funds programme (ESF,
2000-2006) on an intensified basis by means of a
specific focus in Objective 3 Austria programme
(priority 6).
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Objectives and tasks
TEPs contribute _ to greater effectiveness and
efficiency of resources _ to improved support
for certain target groups _ to saving existing
jobs and creating new ones _ to generating
subsidies for regions and _ to maintaining our
living space sustainable. Major tasks of TEPs _
co-ordinating partners and their topics _
developing joint work programmes (TEP-programme)
and _ implementing the measures according to the
emphasis of the TEPs.
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TEP - Partners
Provincial Government
Labour Market Service
Federal Office of Social Affairs
Federation of Industry
Budgets of the partners over EUR 500 Million
p.a.
Chamber of Labour
Federation of Trade Unions
Economic Chamber
Provincial School Board
Chamber of Agriculture
Educational Institutions
Municipalities
NGOs (Local Initiatives)
Gender Mainstreaming Experts
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Examples of Fields of Action
Monitoring / Evaluation
Interdisk - platforms
Regional Managers for Employment
Vienna
Open partnership-process
Upper Austria
Lower Austria
Regional co-ordinatorsfor vocational training
Salzburg
Burgenland
Tyrol
Vorarlberg
Styria
Carinthia
Implementation within Objective 1
Pool of ideas / experimental capital
Local Pacts
Direct linkage with Objective 2 and 3
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Actual topics (Nation-wide)

• _ Nation-wide steps_process Consolidation
  process on organisational development of the
  partnerships, such as e.g.
• clarification of TEP roles and functions
• development of impact chain (Wirkungskette)
• documentation of results achieved
• _ Implementation of the joint development
  partnership TEP_EQUAL_EDLERLY a new,
  innovative labour market instrument for elderly
  people, Elderly plans, is tested by the TEPs
• _ Internationalisation strengthening the
  partnerships through international cooperation
• _ TEPGEM Project

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Austrias lessons learnt

• _ raison dêntre of the partnerships must be
  obvious to all partners
• _ clarification of roles, functions and tasks of
  partners
• _ TEP partners are the core of the partnership,
  the TEP co-ordinations are the drivers of
  partnerships
• _ dominance of partners
• _ documentation of work performed
• _ communication

motivation and patience is needed continuously
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Part IV

• Partnerships as important instrument in
  countries policies

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Why looking at partnerships?

• Partnerships
• _ improve policy co-ordination and adaptation to
  local conditions,
• _ lead to better utilisation and targeting of
  programmes,
• _ integrate civil societys concerns into
  strategic planning exercises through
  more widespread participatory democracy,
• _ stimulate corporate involvement in local
  projects
• _ and promote greater satisfaction with public
  policy.
• (OECD Local Partnerships for better Governance,
  2001)

Partnerships - a bridge for linking concepts to
people
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Examples of types of partnerships

• Irish partnerships partnerships are established
  to promote equality and social economic
  inclusion
• Local strategic partnerships in United Kingdom
  partnerships are created to tackle different
  issues co-operatively on local level
• Territorial Employment Pacts in Austria
  partnerships are established to better link
  employment policy with other policies in order
  to improve the employment situation on regional
  and local level.

Various countries strengthen their partnerships
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Where else? (Selection)
Canadian CFDCs
Partnerships in Norway
Finnish partnerships
WIBs in USA
Irish partnerships
Swedish RGC
LSP in UK
Berlin Pacts
New Zealand RPP
France CBE, MIFE, EREF and PLIE
RESOC SEER in Flanders
LSIPs in Slovak Republic
Austrian TEPs
SNP in Portugal
Hungarian TEPs
Italian TEPs
TEPs in Catalonia
Greek partnerships
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Some numbers (Selection)
Berlin / Germany In Berlin, 12 Local Pacts for
Business and Employment (BBWA) are in
operation. Finland There are 3 area-based
partnerships established covering sub- sections
of counties. France Four main local
co-operation models are created with in total 410
partnerships 70 CBE - Comité de Bassin
dEmploi, 50 MIFE - Maisons de lInformation
sur la Formation et lEmploi, 70 EREF -
Espaces Ruraux Emploi Formation and 20 PLIE -
Plans Locaux pour linsertion et lemploi.
USA There are 593 local Workforce Investment
Boards (WIBs) and 53 State and territorial
WIBs.
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Partnership rationales (Selection)
Catalonia/Spain The EU employment policy was the
motivation and starting point for the creation
of partnerships in Catalonia. Hungary
Increasing of the unemployment rates, movements
of labour force and no adequate communication
between organisations Norway Need for further
economical development and cross-sectoral
coordination of activities at county
level Portugal Positive experience with
partnerships and the need for a
more decentralized policy development process
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Partnership functions (Selection)
Canada Partnerships are multi-functional and
deliver a wide range of business, counselling
and information services to enterprises,
provide capital and access to funds.
Flanders/Belgium Partnerships have advisory
function on employment and economic
policies. Portugal The partnerships are formal
discussion fora or structures on municipality
level in the field of labour market policy and
social policy. Slovak Republic Partnerships
provide a platform for citizens and local
communities to jointly make efforts to find
solutions to their problems and concerns in
the field of social inclusion.
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Similarities

• Most partnerships are characterized by
• _ MULTI-LEVEL Partnerships decision-making
  involves stakeholders from supranational,
  national, regional and local levels.
• _ MULTI-SECTORAL Multi-sectoral (or
  cross-sectoral) partnerships involve
  stakeholders representing various economic
  sectors/branches, governmental and
  non-governmental actors seeking to improve the
  co-ordination between labour market, education,
  economic and social policies at local and
  regional level.
• _ MULTI-DIMENSIONAL Partnerships apply
  integrated approaches to multi- dimensional
  problems.

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Main challenges of partnerships
_ financing the operation (partnership structure,
projects) _ sufficient documentation of work
performed _ adequate performance indicators to
measure added values _ working on different
levels (national/regional/local) requires
precise separations of tasks between levels
(decentralisation) _ useing synergies between
programmes on local/regional level _ capacity
building
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To sum up

• Partnerships
• are important instruments
• in regional economic development and labour
  market policy

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new Polish Partnerships ?

• Partnerships for employment in Poland
• _ isolated single initiatives, e.g. Pakt na Rzecz
  Zatrudnienia
• _ national, regional programme supporting
  employment partnerships?

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Part V

• The OECD LEED Forum mission, strategy and tasks

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The Mission

• The OECD LEED Forum on Partnerships and Local
  Governance aims

to enhance the contribution of partnership
structures to local development and local
governance and the effectiveness of policies.
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Strategy for building the network

• The Forum
• _ is open to all interested partnerships in OECD
  Member countries and countries of Central,
  Eastern and South-Eastern Europe
• _ builds on existing expertise of OECD LEED, the
  Austrian Co-ordination Unit of TEPs and Forum
  Board members (e.g. Ireland, Canada, Flanders)
• _ brings together partnerships by offering
  various activities
• _ continuously develop the network further

Forum partnerships are primarily focusing on
employment and social issues and economic
development
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Tasks of the Forum

• _ Building the network (identification and
  networking of institutions)
• _ Building the data base (Documentary base, Guide
  on successful partnership building and operation)
• _ Forum meetings and International Partnership
  Fair
• _ Mentoring and Policy advice
• _ Information exchange (Annual brochure,
  Electronic newsletter, Forum Website, Electronic
  discussion group)

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International Partnership Fair
13 15 February 2006, Vienna, Parkhotel
Schönbrunn

• Aims
• _ to exchange practical information between
  partnerships and good practices between
  partnerships across countries
• _ and to provide opportunities to build up
  co-operations between partnerships
• Practical Information
• _ number of participants 300 participants
• _ practice examples up to 35 partnerships
• _ organiser Forum, Austrian TEP-Co-ordination
  Unit

www.partnershipfair.zsi..at
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Contact
Centre for Social Innovation - ZSI /
Vienna Anette Scoppetta scoppetta_at_forum.zsi.at H
omepage http//www.pakte.at http//www.zsi.at ht
tp//www.oecd.org/cfe/leed/forum/partnerships
Thank you
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The End
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