EU plans reduced hours scheme to curb virus employment hit

Employment

Brussels, April 1, 2020 (dpa/NAN) The European Commission wants to set up an EU-wide employment scheme that would see workers put in reduced hours while businesses weather the economic storm unleashed by the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Thousands of strong and healthy companies are struggling because of the current crisis,’’ EU Executive Chief, Ursula von der Leyen, said on Wednesday.

“This is why we have developed the concept of short-time work.’’

The scheme would enable employers to hold on to workers even when the business has halted, according to von der Leyen, offering them training instead, for example.

Similar schemes in several EU countries proved useful in the wake of the 2008 financial crash, von der Leyen said in a video statement.

The top EU official is a former German labour minister.

A proposal for the programme is to be set out this week.

The European Union is bracing for a severe recession and soaring unemployment.

Strict lockdown measures, throughout the continent, have seen restaurants and shops shuttered and production grind to a halt.

Italy and Spain, two countries with stubbornly high unemployment, particularly among young people, have been the worst affected by the potentially fatal respiratory disease.

“It is intended to help, Italy, Spain and all other countries that have been hard hit and it will do so, thanks to the solidarity of other member states,’’ von der Leyen said of the scheme.

In the final reading, taken before the outbreak gripped much of Europe, the rate of unemployment in the euro currency area fell to 7.3 per cent in February, official statistics, released on Wednesday, showed.

Joblessness in the 19-country eurozone was down from 7.4 per cent in January.

Across the whole 27-country EU, the rate of unemployment, in February was at 6.5 per cent, according to the EU statistics agency, Eurostat.

Close to 14 million men and women in the EU were out of work in February, Eurostat estimates, including 12 million in the eurozone.

The seasonally adjusted data showed unemployment was at 13.6 per cent in Spain and 9.7 per cent in Italy. (dpa/NAN)

HS/AIB

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Edited by Halima Sheji/Abdulfatah Babatunde