They aim at improving employability, at developing entrepreneurship, at encouraging adaptability in businesses and their employees and at strengthening the policies for equal opportunities. Early identification of individual needs and early action are particularly important when it comes to maintaining and improving the skills and ability of people looking for jobs. For this reason, all Member States committed themselves to offering a new start to every unemployed young person before he or she reaches six months of unemployment and they also decided that unemployed adults should be offered a fresh start before reaching 12 months of unemployment. These measures should be combined with action to promote the return to work of already long-term unemployed people. As I said yesterday, the main focus of the approach is prevention.
Early action is indeed the key for tackling the twin problems of unemployment and social exclusion.
Moreover, benefit and training systems must be geared towards supporting employability and providing real incentives for the unemployed to seek and take up work or training opportunities. They have acknowledged the important role of social partners in this regard and more generally in the development of lifelong learning. Member States have also agreed to reduce substantially the number of young people who drop out of the school system early and to better equip young people with skills relevant to the labour market. Young people without skills find it increasingly difficult to find employment and as we all know, the young unemployed of today become the long-term unemployed of tomorrow. Developing skills is essential, but not enough.