Documents

The increase in the number of own-account workers in the Netherlands has led to discussion within a variety of policy fields. One important point is that own-account workers are basically subject to the same work risks – for example occupational incapacity and unemployment – as employees, despite enjoying less protection within the social security system. In its advisory report to the Dutch Government (Zzp’ers in beeld), the Social and Economic Council favours an integrated approach to own-account workers. The Council surveys the available data on own-account workers and investigates their significance for Dutch society and the Dutch economy. The central issue is whether the current system of labour relations, taxation, and social security requires revision in order to render it future-proof.

Spain's Economic and Social Council (ESC) supports the idea to pass a law organising standards and activities for health protection and promotion.The ESC points out that the action taken by the different authorities involved needs to be coordinated so that the new rules can be as effective as possible. The ESC highlights the fact that public health measures are not implemented in the same way across the board: there are major regional and social differences. The opinion states that increasingly, health risks are appearing which do not respect local boundaries or national borders, and this makes it essential to take coordinated action so that risk can be reduced effectively.The ESC believes that the preliminary draft law should include cross-sector provisions on the specific needs of people with disabilities who require tailored care, so that they can be treated on a case-by-case basis depending on the type and extent of their disability.

The Growth Initiative working group, a working group seeking to strengthen long-term economicgrowth, proposes measures to boost productivity growth in Finland in the 2010s. In the long term,beyond the current economic cycle, growth in productivity will be the only driver of the nation'saverage income growth or GDP per capita. In the short term, improving the employment rate is alsoimportant.The Growth Initiative working group's final report begins by providing a brief introduction to issuesvital to productivity growth. It then presents the working group's policy recommendations, dividedunder the following ten headings: 1) Science and innovation policy, 2) Education policy, 3) Life phasepolicy, 4) Competition policy, 5) Enterprise policy, 6) Public sector operating policy, 7) Public sectorinformation system policy, 8) Public sector procurement policy and the general availability of publiclycollected information, 9) Broadband network and intelligent transport policy and 10) Transportinfrastructure policy.