Parliament apprehensive over employment guidelines 

Following a Commission proposal on 11 December 2007, EU employment ministers agreed that the existing employment guidelines should remain largely unchanged until 2010. At a meeting on 29 February, they confirmed that the priorities should remain full employment, improving quality and productivity at work, social cohesion, work attractiveness and combining flexibility with employment security. 

However, EU heads of state and government will not be able to formally adopt these priorities when they meet for their annual Spring Summit on 13 and 14 March because Parliament's report on the issue, which they must take into consideration although it is non-binding, is not due until May. 

Early signals from the Parliament indicate that it will criticise the approach taken by the Commission and for the most part endorsed by the Council. 

Rapporteur Anne van Lancker (PSE) has repeatedly spoken out in favour of a strengthened social dimension of the guidelines. In the explanatory statement of her first draft report , van Lancker goes to lengths to explaining that "the renewed Lisbon Strategy is not delivering for all European citizens" and that it "may have delivered more jobs but not always better jobs". She also cites figures showing "that Member States are currently not working towards a balanced 'flexicurity' approach." 

Concretely, van Lancker proposes a list of amendments related to strengthening the social dimension of the Lisbon strategy, emphasising job quality and introducing a clause on active inclusion. 

Addressing an audience at the launch of the 'Lisbon Council' think-tank's publication 'European Growth and Jobs Monitor', Commission President José Manuel Barroso said on 4 March 2008: "We want EU leaders at the Spring European Council to put skills at the top of the agenda and to help transform millions of lives by boosting efforts to tackle early school leaving and under-achievement."

Meanwhile, in an open letter to EU heads of state and government, Socialist Group leader Martin Schulz accused Commission President José Manuel Barroso of "burying his head in the sand" over the social aspect of the employment strategy. Despite the "78 million Europeans" living "at risk of poverty" as the EU faces "the challenges of unemployment, social exclusion, climate change and financial market instability," Barroso was "brushing aside parliamentary calls for targeted action," Schulz said. "The Socialist Group finds Mr Barroso's inaction unacceptable and believes that the time has come for the Council to take its responsibilities," the letter added. 

The Socialists issued five policy demands to EU national leaders. Among these were improvements to social inclusion and social protection in order to harness all Europe's talents and allow prosperity to be built by all and shared by all, and the introduction of binding minimum social standards to safeguard the social dimension of the internal market.  

French Conservative MEP Françoise Grossetête said that "re-centering the Growth and Jobs Strategy has not brought about the kind of progress that we were hoping for. The lack of growth is at the heart of Europe's problems".

At a two-day conference on job quality organised by the European Trade Union Confederation, ETUC Confederal Secretary Walter Cerfeda said: "Europe should urgently rediscover the productive power of having good social standards in the workplace. Robust social standards make it in the employers' interest to improve work organisation and to offer good quality jobs so that productivity is increased."