At the Tripartite Social Summit today, Hans-Joachim Reck, President of CEEP said that growth-friendly expenditure with a long-term perspective was essential for Europe. He urged that investments in education, research and innovation, as well as energy had to be prioritised to return to a path of sustainable growth and job creation.
Mr Reck welcomed the allocations for research and development and infrastructure, of the European Council agreed on in a Multi-financial Framework: “Investments in infrastructure do have a positive impact on growth and job creation. But commitments must now turn into action”, Mr Reck stated. Referring to the recently proposed decrease in the Cohesion Policy budget, Mr Reck demonstrated that this is not always the case.

To underline the need of stable public services, he presented the results of the first “Pulse of Public Services” survey conducted by CEEP in February 2013. “Figures show cuts or limitations in public budgets are considered by public service employers to be the biggest impediment to investments, thereby hindering growth over the next 12 months.”
With regards to European initiatives to tackle youth unemployment, the President of CEEP noted that longer term strategies would be needed to foster lasting employment and overcome the demographic challenges facing public services.

”We need further monitoring and benchmarking instruments to better observe social and employment indicators in the European Union. Reasserting the social dimension is a difficult, but important task. I assure the full involvement of CEEP at all levels in this discussion”, concluded Mr Reck.

For further information, please contact:
Priya Klinkenberg- tel. +32 (0) 2 229 21 40
CEEP gathers enterprises and organisations from across Europe, both public and private, at national, regional and local
level, which are public employers or providers of services of general interest. CEEP members contribute to more than 26%
of EU GDP and employ 30% of the EU workforce; CEEP is one of the three general cross-industry European Social Partners.