# Council Decision of 15 July 2008 on guidelines for the employment policies of the Member States (2008/618/EC), Division 3: Increase investment in human capital through better education and skills

Extent: E+W+S+N.I.

Europe needs to invest more and more effectively in human capital. Too many people fail to enter, progress or remain in the labour market because of a lack of skills, or due to skills mismatches. To enhance access to employment for men and women of all ages, raise productivity levels, innovation and quality at work, the EU needs higher and more effective investment in human capital and lifelong learning.
Knowledge-based and service-based economies require different skills from traditional industries; skills which also constantly need updating in the face of technological change and innovation. Workers, if they are to remain and progress in work and be prepared for transition and changing labour markets, need to accumulate and renew skills regularly. The productivity of enterprises is dependent on building and maintaining a workforce that can adapt to change. Governments need to ensure that educational attainment levels are improved and that young people are equipped with the necessary key competences, in line with the European Youth Pact. In order to improve labourmarket prospects for youth, the EU should aim for an average rate of no more than 10 % early school leavers; and for at least 85 % of 22-year-olds to have completed upper secondary education by 2010. Policies should also aim at increasing the EU average level of participation in lifelong learning to at least 12,5 % of the adult working-age population (25 to 64 age group). All stakeholders should be mobilised to develop and foster a true culture of lifelong learning from the earliest age. To achieve a substantial increase in public and private investment in human resources per capita and guarantee the quality and efficiency of these investments, it is important to ensure fair and transparent sharing of costs and responsibilities between all actors. Member States should make better use of the Structural Funds and the European Investment Bank for investment in education and training. To achieve these aims, Member States must implement the coherent and comprehensive lifelong learning strategies to which they have committed themselves.
Guideline 23. Expand and improve investment in human capital through:
inclusive education and training policies and action to facilitate significantly access to initial vocational, secondary and higher education, including apprenticeships and entrepreneurship training,
significantly reducing the number of early school leavers,
efficient lifelong learning strategies open to all in schools, businesses, public authorities and households according to European agreements, including appropriate incentives and cost-sharing mechanisms, with a view to enhancing participation in continuous and workplace training throughout the life-cycle, especially for the low-skilled and older workers.
See also integrated guideline ‘To increase and improve investment in R & D, in particular by private business’ (No 7).
Setting ambitious objectives and increasing levels of investment by all actors is not enough. To ensure that supply meets demand in practice, lifelong learning systems must be affordable, accessible and responsive to changing needs. Adaptation and capacity-building of education and training systems and measures to improve the evidence base of education and training policies are necessary to improve their labour market relevance, their responsiveness to the needs of the knowledge-based economy and society and their efficiency, excellence and equity. An easily accessible, widespread and integrated system of lifelong career orientation should increase both individuals’ access to education and training and the relevance to skills needs of education and training offered. ICT can be used to improve access to learning and to tailor it better to the needs of employers and employees.
Greater mobility for both work and learning purposes is also needed to access job opportunities more widely in the EU at large. The remaining obstacles to mobility within the European labour market should be lifted, in particular those relating to the recognition and transparency and use of learning outcomes and qualifications, notably by implementing the European Qualifications Framework by relating national qualification systems to that Framework by 2010 and, where appropriate, by developing national qualification frameworks. It will be important to make use of the agreed European instruments and references to support reforms of national education and training systems, as laid down in the Education and Training 2010 Work Programme.
Guideline 24. Adapt education and training systems in response to new competence requirements by:
raising and ensuring the attractiveness, openness and quality standards of education and training, broadening the supply of education and training opportunities and ensuring flexible learning pathways and enlarging possibilities for mobility for students and trainees,
easing and diversifying access for all to education and training and to knowledge by means of working time organisation, family support services, vocational guidance and, if appropriate, new forms of cost sharing,
responding to new occupational needs, key competences and future skill requirements by improving the definition and transparency of qualifications, their effective recognition and the validation of non-formal and informal learning.

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Source: https://www.legislation.gov.uk/eudn/2008/618/annex/division/Guidelines/division/3 (the official version)
Page: https://openlegislation.uk/eu-decision-2008-618/annex/division-Guidelines/division-3
Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Source: legislation.gov.uk, The National Archives.