The social service sector is of key importance for the nursing community as it relates to topics such as long-term care, care for the elderly, and the working conditions and composition of the workforce. The EFN is an advocate of nurses in these EU policy areas, as part of the European Pillar of Social Rights.
As such, the EFN was invited by the Federation of European Social Employers, in cooperation with the European Public Service Union, to the \final conference of the PESSIS+ project at the premises of the European Economic Social Committee. The PESSIS+ project fostered social dialogue in seven (Croatia, Cyprus, Denmark, Estonia, Latvia, Luxembourg and Malta) European countries, and concluded with the reports on the state of play of social dialogue structures in the social services sector in these. These reports will soon be published on the project’s website.
Stakeholders discussed the future challenges of the European social dialogue. These relate to the gap in the quantity of public funding available social care across European countries, the working conditions of the workforce, the lack of data available at the European level, and the lack of trade unions in some countries. Overall, stakeholders agreed that the social services sector would benefit if its challenges are tackled at the European level.