Debate: EU Blue Card Directive
Date: TUESDAY, 14 SEPTEMBER 2021
Speaker: Ylva Johansson
Language: EN

This file was blocked for four years, but you unblocked it. You show that Europe can unite on migration. You show that Europe can find compromises on migration. You show that Europe can turn from a blocked situation into a situation with strengthened and better legal pathways to the European Union. This is really something to congratulate. That’s why this is a very important agreement for Europe. Europe needs skilled workers at all levels: low, medium and high. With this agreement, we welcome the highly-skilled workers we need. Nearly 60% of businesses in Europe say they cannot find people with the right IT skills. Our societies also need doctors, engineers, chemists and teachers. We are losing the global race for talent. At the moment, highly-educated migrants prefer North America, Australia and New Zealand to Europe. With this agreement on the Blue Card, we can catch up in this race. The Blue Card is a residence permit for highly-qualified workers to come to the European Union. With a Blue Card in your pocket, you will have more opportunities in all Member States. With this agreement, it will be easier for people to get a Blue Card thanks to lower entry demands for contract duration and thanks to a more realistic and fair salary threshold. Many more people will be able to apply and will want to apply. It will be easier for Blue Card holders to change jobs between Member States and for their families to be able to join them sooner. And Blue Card holders are better protected with this agreement: if they lose their jobs after two years of work, they may stay in the EU for six months to look for a new job. The Blue Card, in my view, is much more than an opportunity for a nice job and a good career in Europe. It’s a chance for a life here in Europe, with all the history and culture and energy our vibrant European cities and regions and our continent have to offer – and that makes the Blue Card uniquely attractive in the global competition for talent. We won’t win that competition if Member States compete among themselves, with national schemes that may offer attractive working conditions but zero labour mobility – as is happening right now, actually. We have brought European added value to the European Blue Card. The Commission’s proposal was to have just one EU Blue Card and abolish national schemes. This was also strongly advocated by the Parliament. But we have had to compromise, and I stay by that compromise. We put in place safeguards that create a level playing field between the Blue Card and national schemes. This will allow the Blue Card to reach its full potential. The political agreement we are discussing today also allows refugees to apply for a Blue Card, and I’m very happy about that. Never underestimate the skills, talent, energy and ambition that refugees have to offer. Just think of the people now fleeing Afghanistan, who we were actually evacuating in the very last weeks from Afghanistan: judges, lawyers, journalists, interpreters – very highly-skilled people. I will soon host another high—level resettlement forum to help people in need, especially women, to find a safe journey to a welcome home, not least from Afghanistan. This agreement on the Blue Card tells refugees: ‘You are part of us’. Europe doesn’t only need engineers, software programmers and web developers. We also need nurses, cooks, plumbers, truck drivers, welders, bricklayers, electricians, carpenters. This summer, the Commission launched the Talent Partnerships to help people from third countries work, train and study in Europe. We are now developing a skills and talent package: a set of proposals under the New Pact on Migration and Asylum. I want to improve the rights and mobility of migrants who already live here by revising the directive on long—term residence. I want to make it easier for employers to attract low- and medium—skilled workers by revising the Single Permit Directive. We will launch an EU talent pool: a platform to match the skills of migrant workers with the needs of EU employers. I welcome the draft report on legal migration by rapporteur Abir Al-Sahlani.  I will take the Parliament’s views into account when preparing those proposals, and I’m sure that we will be able to progress on these proposals too. Because this political agreement on the Blue Card is another important step forward on the Pact, and it shows that we – the Commission, the Parliament, the Council – can move forward on legal migration. Let this agreement inspire us to work together in the same spirit of pragmatism, cooperation and compromises on all proposals under the New Pact on Migration and Asylum.