Observation (CEACR) - adopted 2009, published 99th ILC session (2010)

Human Resources Development Convention, 1975 (No. 142) - Netherlands (Ratification: 1979)

Articles 1–5 of the Convention. Formulation and implementation of education and training policies and cooperation with social partners. The Committee notes the Government’s report for the period ending June 2008, and the comments provided by the Trade Union Confederation of Middle and Higher Level Employees’ Unions (MHP), received in August 2008. The Committee notes that a Working and Learning Project Department was established in March 2005 with a view to increase lifelong learning and to improve matching education with the demand of the labour market. In particular, the Department was established to provide training, retraining and further training for employees and jobseekers. In 2005–07, the Working and Learning Project Department focused on the creation of 15,000 combined working and learning courses, 20,000 Accreditation of Prior Learning trajectories and an infrastructure to facilitate lifelong learning through the establishment of Working and Learning Desks. In order to boost the levels of qualification and, as a corollary, the rate of labour market participation, the tenure of the Project Department was extended until 2011, so as to concentrate on establishing 90,000 working and learning trajectories, with a special focus on young working people with no basic qualifications and jobseekers who are difficult to place. The Project Department will also consider longer term developments in lifelong learning through a specially appointed think tank, a conference on lifelong learning and discussions on training with the social partners. In this regard, the Committee notes the comments from MHP in which it indicates that the Government has been planning to ask the Social and Economic Council for recommendations on lifelong learning for some time. Furthermore, the Government indicates that the Institute for Employee Benefit Schemes (UWV) is making use of a training protocol, which is a series of guidelines indicating when training should be considered for UWV clients. MHP also refers to the consultations held to discuss the preparation of a “training manifesto”. Finally, the Government indicates that the incentive scheme to encourage vacancies to be filled by the unemployed and workers threatened with unemployment (SVWW) has been discontinued. In this regard, MHP regrets that this scheme has not been replaced by a similar demand-driven scheme. The Committee asks the Government to provide in its next report information on the activities of the Working and Learning Project Department, and other machinery for the development of comprehensive and coordinated policies and programmes of vocational guidance and training indicating, in particular, the way in which effective coordination is assured and the manner in which the policies and programmes are linked with employment and the public employment service. The Committee also asks the Government to include information on the development of the “training manifesto” and on other means by which the cooperation of employers’ and workers’ organizations is ensured, including through the Social and Economic Council, in the formulation and implementation of vocational guidance and vocational training policies and programmes.