Roxana Mînzatu passes the specialized commissions and awaits the vote of the European Parliament

Roxana Mînzatu, our country's proposal for the position of European Commissioner, successfully passed her hearing yesterday by the members of the Civil Liberties, Justice and Internal Affairs (LIBE), Labor Force and Social Affairs (EMPL), Culture and Education (CULT) commissions ), and for Women's Rights and Equal Opportunities (FEMME) to hold the position of Vice-President of the European Commission for People, Skills and Vocational Training.

During the hearing, Roxana Mînzatu stated that education, quality jobs and raising the standard of living for vulnerable people are the priorities of her mandate as vice-president of the European Commission, in case she passes the European Parliament vote scheduled for the entire Community Executive in the session from November 25-28 in Strasbourg.

Roxana Mînzatu stated: "The citizens of Europe have gone through a period of uncertainty in the last 5 years, such as the Covid pandemic, the war in Ukraine, the companies that moved their headquarters, the increase in the price of energy that attracted the increase in prices and inflation , as well as with disasters due to climate events, such as the recent ones in Spain. Europe is a kind of athlete in a complex competition that must increase its level of preparation, training and endurance to protect its people from childhood to old age. (...) I will initiate a social policy dialogue to ensure that work and welfare are on the same level. I will talk to all social partners, governments, national parliaments, citizens and youth organizations, because I want them to have an inclusive debate, a democratic dialogue on our jobs and skills, to build a new action plan for the pillar European Social Policy".

The commissioner-designate stated that he would support his mandate on three pillars. The first refers to education, a field in which, although the Erasmus Plus program is an example of good practices, according to Roxana Mînzatu, the EU member states are facing the deterioration of the basic skills of the young generations, with an alarming shortage of teaching staff (registered in 24 of member states from the 27, according to the information provided by the future vice-president of the European Commission) and with the lack of digital skills necessary for many European citizens.

"I want us to finance more everything that Europe needs for the future. We must stop the brain drain by offering our students modern university campuses, based on the amounts allocated through the Erasmus program. We want to strengthen education and training. We need to renew Erasmus to begin with and make it healthy in the future multiannual financial framework", said Roxana Mînzatu.

The second pillar concerns the creation of quality jobs that provide decent incomes to employees and enable continuous learning and training. The third pillar of Roxana Mînzatu's mandate will be social justice, which will aim at lifting vulnerable people out of poverty, increasing equal opportunities between women and men, as well as building affordable housing for truly vulnerable people.

• Fund for Just Transition and Social Fund for Climate, funding sources for quality jobs and for supporting vulnerable people

Mrs. Mînzatu also referred to the introduction in the future, on the labor market, of the social security passport, a document that is in the testing phase through two European projects and that would be generalized depending on the results obtained in the respective projects. Regarding the impact of Artificial Intelligence on jobs in the European Union, Roxana Mînzatu stated that, although AI and technology offer opportunities and quality jobs in different fields, there is a need to monitor labor relations and dialogue with social partners, for to provide a strategic response at the European level regarding policies, legislation regarding the respect of workers' rights, regardless of whether they work hybridly or remotely. Regarding the employees of online platforms, their rights would be covered by future European regulations regarding the management of AI and algorithms.

Regarding the Just Transition Fund, Mrs. Mînzatu said that it is important for the creation of quality jobs and for supporting economic restructuring in socially disadvantaged areas. She specified that where there will not be enough funds for the just transition, a transition that is not in the portfolio of the mandate it targets, the respective amounts will be supplemented from other European programs, so that people acquire ecological and technical skills to- and increase potential. One of the sources of funding could be the Social for the Climate Fund stated Roxana Mînzatu.

She stated that there is a need for a skills revolution, the portability of skills, in today's changing economy.

Asked if the rights of vulnerable people will be ensured in the context of the increase in military spending at the European level, Roxana Mînzatu said that no amount will be reduced regarding the protection of citizens' rights and showed that there are amounts in the Social Fund for Climate to support consumers in the face of price increases to energy, but also that the amounts regarding social protection and support for young people and children are well established in the European multiannual financial framework. She showed that the Social Fund for Climate has an allocation of 87 billion euros, of which 25% is co-financing from the member states, which each draw up a national plan to protect vulnerable households, plans that must be submitted by the end of June of the year future. For Romania, this fund means 6 billion euros, money that will be used to support the green transition, said Roxana Mînzatu.

The only uncomfortable questions in yesterday's debate came from those from Renew Europe and ECR, regarding the extension of the house in Braşov of the Mînzatu family and how it related to the laws of justice from the PSDragnea period, when he was a deputy in Parliament of Romania. Roxana Mînzatu stated that the building in Braşov is not a historical monument even though it is located in the historical area of the city, and with regard to the laws of justice, she stated that she supports European values in this field.