Tackling youth and long-term unemployment in Spain

The commission supported the Spanish Public Employment Service (SEPE) with the coordination and monitoring of the implementation of the 2019-2021 Youth Employment Action Plan and the 2019-2021 Long-term Unemployment Action plan. Technical support focused on developing methodologies and tools for monitoring the implementation, and supporting SEPE in facilitating the exchange of best practices among the regional public employment services in Spain.

Context

Spain has one of the highest rates of youth unemployment (22.4%) and long-term unemployment (42.62 %,% of all unemployed) in the EU. While these rates in large part reflect deficiencies in the labour market, they also indicate problems related to the public labour market integration strategies and policy delivery. In response, the Government of Spain has adopted and started to develop new strategies and action plans for employment activation. The 2017-2020 Spanish Strategy for Employment Activation has been adopted at the end of 2017, followed by the 2019-2021 Youth Employment Action Plan at the end of 2018, while the adoption of the 2019-2021 Long-term Unemployment Action Plan is planned for the beginning of 2nd quarter of 2019. Against this background, the Spanish Public Employment Service (“SEPE”) requested technical support with the implementation of the Youth and Long-term Unemployment Action Plans.

Support delivered

1. Mapping of measures targeting Youth and Long-term unemployed across the Comunidades Autónomas (autonomous regions).
2. Proposal for the standardization of the measures included in the Youth Employment and Long-term Unemployed Action Plans.
3. Report on selected practices from autonomous regions in implementing both Action Plans (Monitoring reports).
4. Report on up to two “Community of practice” workshops focused on the identified good practices in the implementation of the Action Plans, at regional level.
5. Two summary reports, containing a comprehensive assessment of the implementation of both Action plans, across the country at large.

Results achieved

The general objective of the project was to enhance the capacity of the Spanish authorities to foster and monitor the progress in the implementation of the Youth Employment Action Plan and the Long-term unemployment Action Plan. The specific outcomes of the project were:

1. To assist SEPE with the coordination, fostering, and monitoring of the implementation of the Youth Employment Action Plan and the Long-term unemployment Action Plan, by developing monitoring systems and data collection for the actions and the policy measures envisaged in both Actions Plans; and
2. To strengthen knowledge-sharing on the implementation of both Plans among the public employment services of the autonomous communities and other relevant entities involved in the implementation of the Action Plans.