Mr. Ivailo Kalfin:

Thank you very much, a Chathaoirligh, and honourable members of the committee for the invitation and the opportunity to present on the work of Eurofound. As the Chair said, it is the only EU agency working in Ireland, but it is also one of the first European agencies. Fifty years ago, it was an Irish idea to start developing the agencies. This was how the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions was created. The European Centre for the Development of Vocational Training, Cedefop, currently based in Thessaloniki, was also created 50 years ago. It was the idea of the first Irish Commissioner, and later President of Ireland, Dr. Patrick Hillery. That was also an Irish initiative. It is why we are here.

We have worked for 50 years in four particular areas.

This is in our founding regulation. It has been renewed once but the areas of competence remain the same. This is everything that happens in the labour market and developments in employment. We recently have been following developments with digitalisation and the introduction of artificial intelligence to the workplace, what happens with the different new forms of work such as platform work, for example, and how work is organised in terms of working arrangements. In recent years we have also zoomed into sectors that are of particular interest where we see considerable shortages of labour. These include transport, construction, agriculture and the ICT sector, where they are struggling to get staff. We arer trying to find the answer as to what is happening in these sectors, what is eventually going to happen, what could be expected and what possible measures could be taken. This is the first area, employment and developments in the employment market.

The second area is working conditions, and everything in the world of work. We have a methodology that has been around for 30 years and is widely recognised in respect of the quality of jobs. This methodology could be applied at national, regional, company or sectoral level to show what is important for the workers in the workplace and what could attract and retain them. This is the European working conditions survey the chair mentioned, which we conducted in all EU member states in the last year. We have started disclosing and analysing the results. If there is an interest, I would be more than happy to tell the committee more about the findings because they are extremely interesting.

The third area is living conditions, or everything that happens with citizens outside of work. It very much has to do with public services and the support they might have outside of work. In recent years we have zoomed in on some very interesting sectors such as housing, people with disabilities, different vulnerable groups, young people including those who are not in employment, the ageing workforce and what happens when workers and employees grow older. These are the areas we are researching. We collect data in all EU member states so our research allows for a comparison between all EU member states including Ireland and also to zoom in on some particular landscapes such as the gender divide, the urban-rural divide, or different income brackets and how people fare with that.

The fourth area is social dialogue. We are probably the only EU institution that is dealing with the social dialogue between employers and workers at European and often national level. Those are our four areas of competence.

The agency comprises about 100 people from 21 European countries and is based in Loughlinstown, south Dublin. We have quite a large management board but I think this is of value for the agency. We are one of only three tripartite agencies in Europe, which means our board includes representatives from every member state, including representatives of government, employers and workers. Of course, in the case of Ireland, we have on the board representatives from IBEC, ICTU and the Department of Enterprise, Tourism and Employment and the Department of Social Protection. This is the Irish representation on the board. That makes it quite large with 27 countries and three representatives per country, plus the European Commission, European Parliament, other agencies observing and so on. However, it works very well and there is a good modus operandi. We publish about 40 reports annually. We are a research agency, which means that we stop when we deliver our research to the decision-makers, that is, people like the committee members and their peers. We are not into producing or creating policies. Of course, when we research a subject, we might have some policy points and might focus attention on some particular good experiences or not so good experiences of some member states. This is material for the decision-makers to have an informed discussion and make informed decisions afterwards. Our very clear role is to support decision-makers, who then move on and make the decisions. We publish around 40 reports every year and along with all the other publications such as articles, policy briefs and working papers, this comes to 150 publications. It is quite active. We are a public institution and there is no paywall, so everything is publicly accessible through our website. We are very happy to work with our stakeholders, including governments.

We work not only with the main European institutions but also at national level with the presidencies. We are already in contact with the Irish EU Presidency preparing in our area of work whatever are the priorities chosen by the Irish EU Presidency. If we have research or are ready to conduct some particular research on a priority area, we would be happy to provide briefings, data and information. This is what we are doing for the Presidencies on a regular basis. We are often invited to present at the European Parliament on different topics. If there were an interest, we would be happy to present to the Oireachtas on any issues, whether housing or other topics that would be of interest. This is also something we do on a regular basis.

I think I have just gone over my five minutes. I am happy to take questions.