SOCIALISTS LAUNCH CAMPAIGN ON OUTSOURCING OF EUROPEAN JOBS

Today PES Group Members will join with trade unions to launch a campaign to get the European Parliament to support a European wide plan to address the offshoring of hundreds of thousands of jobs from EU member states.

A Declaration signed by Claude MORAES, Stephen HUGHES, Mel READ, Mariene GILLIG and Alejandro CERCAS calls on the Commission to produce a report on the employment impact of outsourcing.

Claude MORAES, who drew up the Declaration, said: "We, as PES Members, are putting this major jobs and globalisation issue on the agenda of the European Parliament for the first time. Every day EU companies, particularly in the UK, France, Spain and Scandinavia outsource key jobs in areas such as call centres, airlines, legal processing and finance to developing countries like India.

"The UK jobs are going to India, French jobs are going to North Africa, Spanish jobs are going to South and Central America, German jobs are going to Eastern Europe and Africa and Scandinavian jobs are going to the Baltic States and India.

"While some of these jobs will benefit developing countries, we believe that the EU and individual Member States need to do much more in regional policy to respond to dramatic job losses which can leave communities in shock.

"In the European Parliament, we understand this is not an issue of protectionism but one of waking up Member States to the need for strategies to cope with serious job losses, and the need to move further towards the Lisbon agenda, which calls on the EU to move towards more and higher quality jobs."

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