EU Council on 23-24 March 2006 reaffirms that child poverty is a priority of the European social inclusion policy and "asks the Member States to take necessary measures to rapidly and significantly reduce child poverty"

EU Council on 23-24 March 2006 reaffirms that child poverty is a priority of the European social inclusion policy and "asks the Member States to take necessary measures to rapidly and significantly reduce child poverty"

The need for such policies has already emerged during the symposium dealing with "Street children and youth as a priority of the EU's social inclusion policy for the new Member States in Central and Eastern Europe", organised in December of 2004 by EFSC (see Report). In order to improve the national action plans to combat child poverty, EFSC expressed in its final recommendations addressed to the Governments the following needs: to develop better communication between local and state governments, and NGOs intervening in the field through innovative information and communication tools; to implement and develop NAPs/incl at social and municipal level (inclusion at local and regional level); and, to strengthen the capacity building at municipal level. The multidisciplinary approach brings together all actors to discuss problems, list common goals and shared initiatives concerning child poverty and social exclusion (teachers, social workers, representatives of the local authorities, experts, etc.) and is essential to ensure the achievement of reducing child poverty. In particular, EFSC aims to combat poverty that affects its specific target group: excluded and marginalized children.

It is for this reason that EFSC fully supports the declaration that "the number of children in poverty should be reduced giving all children equal opportunities, regardless of their social background".

The need to urgently face this problem at European level is clearly shown by other reports recently published:

• UNICEF Report on Child Poverty in Rich Countries (2005), declares that the proportion of children living in poverty has risen in 17 out of the 24 OECD Member States since the early 1990s;
• The European Commission's Analysis of the National Action Plans on Social Inclusion (NAPs/incl. 2004-2006) submitted by the 10 new Member States highlights that the highest risk of poverty concerns children up to the age of 15;
• The thematic study, using transnational comparisons to analyse and identify cultural policies and programmes that contribute to preventing and reducing child poverty and social exclusion (carried out by the University of Dortmund for the European Commission) also confirms that, in most of the countries studied, child poverty rates are higher than those of the population as a whole. Child poverty has to be fought through an integrated approach that comprises a cross-cutting mix of policies on all administrative levels.

As children and youth are not only the future of any human society but also the most vulnerable social group in European countries, EFSC's network strongly believes that the EU needs to invest more in them in terms of policies and funds particularly focused on prevention measures. As the early prevention method shows, to intervene with inclusive policies on children at an early stage can more easily prevent the degeneration that affects our societies such as poverty, criminality, dropping out of school, violence and social exclusion and contributes to reducing the expenses in the social area.
Following the relaunch of the Lisbon Strategy by the European Council, because Member States had made insufficient progress in reaching the Lisbon goals, EFSC invites the Council to take into account the need to reduce child poverty in its decisions and call upon the European Commission and the national governments to take actions and set specific timetables to reach this goal. The Council can play an important political role as stated in Article 4 of the EU Treaty: the European Council "… shall provide the Union with the necessary impetus for its development and define the general political guidelines thereof."

Read the Presidency Conclusions

For futher information, please contact Elisabetta Fonck, EFSC Advocacy, Lobbying and Fundraising Officer elisabetta.fonck@enscw.org

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