CELEX: 31971D0066
Language: en
Date: 1971-02-01 00:00:00
Title: 71/66/EEC: Council Decision of 1 February 1971 on the reform of the European Social Fund

52                                    Official Journal of the European Communities
4.2.71                                Official Journal of the European Communities                            No L 28 / 15
                                                  COUNCIL DECISION
                                                    of 1 February 1971
                                       on the reform of the European Social Fund
                                                        (71/66/EEC)
THE COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES,                         Whereas the Fund must likewise contribute to the
                                                                 furtherance of existing measures for securing for all
Having regard to the Treaty establishing the                     workers employment that best corresponds to their
European Economic Community, and in particular                   abilities, and to ensure continuity of employment and
Article .126 thereof;                                            of income;
Having regard to the Opinion of the Commission1 ;                Whereas it is therefore necessary that the Fund
                                                                 should be able to intervene to meet situations arising
Having regard to the Opinion of the European                     from Community Decisions or requiring action at
Parliament2;                                                     Community level and to meet also situations arising
                                                                 indirectly from the funtioning of the common market
Having regard to the Opinion of the Economic and                 or impeding the harmonious development of the
Social Committee3 ;                                              Community;
Whereas Article 123 of the Treaty assigns to the                 Whereas the Decision of 21 April 19704 provided for
European Social Fund (hereinafter called the 'Fund')             the replacement of financial contributions from
the task of rendering the employment of workers                  Member States by the Communities' own resources ;
easier and of increasing their geographical and
occupational mobility within the Community, and
whereas the measures now in force have proved to be              HAS ADOPTED THIS DECISION :
inadequate to permit the Fund to accomplish this
task effectively;
                                                                 I. ABOLITION OF THE ASSISTANCE PROVIDED FOR
                                                                             IN ARTICLE 125 OF THE TREATY
Whereas, in pursuing this task, account must be
taken of the demands of social progress in the face of                                   Article 1
technical development;
Whereas an interdependence exists between social                 Subject to the provisions of Article 10 of this
policy and economic policy;                                      Decision, the assistance provided for in Article 125 of
                                                                 the Treaty shall no longer be granted.
Whereas it is important to continue efforts to remedy
the structural unemployment and underemployment
                                                                 II . DEFINITION OF THE NEW TASKS OF THE FUND
 still existing in various areas of the Community;
Whereas for this purpose there is also need to                                           Article 2
intensify preventive action against unemployment and
 underemployment;                                                 The new tasks of the Fund, which are in accordance
                                                                  with the objectives laid down in Article 124 of the
                                                                  Treaty, are set out in Articles 3, 4 and 5.
1 OJ No C 131, 13.10.1969, p. 4.
2 OJ No C 2, 8.1.1970, p . 7.
3 OJ No C 26, 4.3.1970, p. 6.                                     4 OJ No L 94, 28.4.1970, p. 19.
 ---pagebreak---                                     Official Journal of the European Communities                                     53
              A. Scope as regards persons                      ( c) shall determine, where appropriate, the categories
                                                                    of persons who are to pursue activities as
                         Article 3                                   self-employed persons to whom assistance may
                                                                     be granted from the Fund.
1.     The Fund may grant assistance for members of
the labour force who, having benefited from a
measure taken under the powers of the Fund, are to                                     Article 5
pursue activities as employed persons.
                                                               1.     The Fund can also take action where the
2. The Fund may also grant, in special cases to be             employment situation in certain regions, in certain
determined by the Council, assistance for persons              branches of the economy or in certain groups of
who are to pursue activities as self-employed persons.         undertakings is affected by difficulties which do not
                                                               arise from any particular measure taken by the
                                                               Council within the framework of a Community
                                                               policy, but which result indirectly from the working
                 B. Areas of intervention                      of the common market or impede the harmonious
                                                               development of the Community.
                         Article 4
                                                               In any such cases, assistance shall be granted to
1.     The    Fund     can   take   action    when    the      eliminate long-term structural unemployment and
employment situation :                                         underemployment, to train a highly skilled labour
                                                               force and, furthermore, for measures for the
— is affected or in danger of being affected either by         absorption and reabsorption into active employment
     special measures adopted by the Council in the            of the disabled, and of older workers, women and
     framework of Community policies, or by jointly            young workers.
     agreed operations to further the objectives of the
     Community ; or
                                                               2. The provisions required to implement this
— calls for specific joint action to improve the               Decision, to be adopted in accordance with Article
     balance between supply of and demand for                   127 of the Treaty, shall :
     manpower within the Community.
                                                               — define the assistance referred to in paragraph 1
                                                                    which shall be granted forthwith to meet already
The Fund shall be authorised to intervene by a                      existing situations or needs that require
specific Decision taken by the Council, acting by a                 immediate long-term action ; and
qualified majority on a proposal from the
Commission, the latter acting either on its own                — determine the precise criteria which an operation
initiative or at the request of the Council or of one or            must satisfy to be eligible for assistance from the
more Member States .                                                Fund.
                                                               Assistance thus defined shall be granted without
2.     The Council, in taking specific Decisions of the        further action by the Council, subject only to the
type referred to in paragraph I, shall state as one of         approval provided for in Article 7.
the grounds of such Decisions the fact that the
existing or foreseeable imbalance in the field of
employment:
— is on a scale justifying Community intervention ;             C. Submission by Member States of schemes or of
                                                               applications for assistance and their approval by the
— is such that it leads, or may lead, to the necessity                                Commission
     for a considerable number of workers to change
     employment, to acquire new qualifications, or to                                  Article 6
     move their homes within the Community.
                                                               The Member State or States concerned shall submit
In such Decisions, the Council :                                to the Commission their schemes for meeting the
( a) shall determine the areas in which the Fund may            situations referred to in Article 4, and any
      intervene;                                                applications made in advance for assistance to meet
                                                                the situations referred to in Article 5 ; each scheme or
 (b) shall state which of the types of aid defined in           application shall propose a set of specific measures,
      provisions laid down pursuant to Article 127              and shall also give details of their methods, scope and
      may qualify for assistance from the Fund;                 duration.
 ---pagebreak--- 54                                 Official Journal of the European Communities
                        Article 7                             Credits for action under Article 5 shall not in any
                                                              year be less than 50% of the total credits available.
The   Commission     shall submit the schemes       and       This apportionment of credits shall be reviewed by
applications referred to in Article 6 for consideration       the Council within the time limit laid down in Article
by the Economic and Social Committee, as provided             11 , it being understood that in the long term the
for in Article 124 of the Treaty, and shall approve           greater part of the available credits must be reserved
them up to the amount of the credits available if they        for action under Article 4 .
comply with the conditions laid down in the
Regulation implementing the provisions of Article
127 of the Treaty and the Decisions taken by the                   III . TRANSITIONAL AND FINAL PROVISIONS
Council under that Regulation.
                                                                                     Article 10
                D. Rate of contribution                       1 . The provisions of this Decision shall apply from
                                                              the date of entry into force of the provisions required
                        Article 8                             to implement this Decision, which shall be adopted in
                                                              accordance with Article 127 of the Treaty.
1.    Assistance from the Fund shall be granted at the
rate of 50% of eligible expenditure in support of             2 . Assistance from the Fund, as provided for in
operations by public authorities, bodies governed by          Article 125 of the Treaty, shall be granted in support
public law and joint social institutions entrusted with       of operations completed at latest on a date to be
tasks in the public interest.                                 fixed by the provisions referred to in paragraph 1 .
                                                              The periods within which the Member States must
2 . Assistance shall also be granted in respect of            submit their applications for reimbursement in respect
operations by bodies or other entities governed by             of these operations shall also be determined by those
private law, on condition that the public authorities         provisions .
of the Member State or States concerned guarantee
the completion of such operations. In such case, the                                 Article 11
Fund shall contribute an amount equal to any
expenditure taken oyer by the public authorities.             The Council shall review this Decision not later than
                                                              five years after the date of its entry into force as
                                                               provided in Article 10 ( 1 ). If necessary, this Decision
                E. Budgetary procedure                         shall be amended on the basis of a further Opinion of
                                                              the. Commission based on Article 126 of the Treaty.
                        Article 9
1 . Each year, on the basis of the preliminary draft                                 Article 12
budget drawn up by the Commission, credits
authorised for the functioning of the Fund during the         This Decision shall enter into force on the fifth day
current financial year shall be included in the budget        following its publication in the Official Journal of the
of the European Communities.                                  European Communities.
The financial regulations adopted in pursuance of
Article 209 of the Treaty shall determine the methods         Done at Brussels, 1 February 1971 .
whereby the expenditure may be authorised for a
further two-year period after the end of the current
financial year.                                                                                    For the Council
                                                                                                    The President
2.    Credits for action by the Fund under Article 4.
shall be separate from those for action under Article 5 .                                          M. SCHUMANN