European Employment Services

Citation

(1999), "European Employment Services", Journal of European Industrial Training, Vol. 23 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/jeit.1999.00323aab.001

European Employment Services

European Employment Services (EURES)

Keywords Employment, Europe, Information, Recruitment

A Eurocounsellor is a specialist who helps people find work in another European country by giving them information and advice and, if possible, finding them a job. He/she also informs employers hoping to recruit workers from abroad. The European Employment Services (EURES) network has some 500 Eurocounsellors in the European Union and in Iceland and Norway, which are members of the European Economic Area.

Most Eurocounsellors work in public employment agencies or other national public services. Other Eurocounsellors work for trade unions, employers' organizations, universities or regional authorities.

Eurocounsellors have two databases at their disposal. One contains detailed information on living and working conditions in the other European Union countries: wages and salaries, taxes, social security, schools for children and other aspects relevant to the decision on whether to live in another country. This database has started to produce panorama of the employment situation in various European Union regions: unemployment figures, qualifications required by employers, new graduates coming on to the labour market. This aspect of EURES will be perfected with a view to developing a European labour market.

The other database presents job vacancies open to all Europeans without any nationality conditions. Although the right to work in any member state is one of the European Union's principles, some posts are reserved for nationals, in particular in the army, the police, the judiciary and the senior civil service.

EURES, which was launched in November 1994, operates with European Union funds. In 1997, it received a budget allocation of ECU 10.5 million. In 1996 and 1997, over one million people contacted EURES ­ that is more than twice as many as over the initial period (1994-95). It is likely that tens of thousands have found jobs through this service, particularly in data processing, tourism and health care. EURES presents daily some 50,000 to 100,000 job vacancies.

Through EURES, national employment bodies can make agreements with each other so that posts can be filled in a country where a large number of workers are needed for a given project. For example, EURES has made it easier to recruit across frontiers for computer firms in Ireland, for Eurodisney in France and for the tourism sector in Austria and Greece.

In 18 frontier regions of the European Union (spanning all Member States except Greece and Finland), EURES Eurocounsellors have joined together to share information on their respective regions and to pool job vacancies and situations wanted. In some cases, such as Germany and Austria, all job offers without exception are notified to the neighbouring region on the other side of the frontier.

EURES will be further expanded, but there is still some resistance to overcome. In certain regions severely affected by unemployment, the public authorities are reluctant to open up the labour market to neighbouring countries.

You can access EURES on the Internet: http://europa.eu.int/jobs/eures