What changed between the plenary report and the adopted text

7. Calls on the Commission to acknowledge the structural links between poverty and gender-based violence and to address gender-based violence as a key strategy for eradicating poverty, in particular poverty among women and children, recognising that eliminating all types of violence is essential for women’s ability to participate fully in their communities and the economy, to access education, employment and social services, and thereby achieve financial independence; urges the Commission and the Member States to boost public investment in policies that address gender-based violence; welcomes the EU’s ratification of the Istanbul Convention and urges Bulgaria, Czechia, Hungary, Lithuania and Slovakia to complete their ratification processes without further delay; calls on the Commission to ensure the effective implementation of the Directive on combating violence against women and domestic violence, guaranteeing that women experiencing poverty and other types of violence have adequate and unconditional access to shelters, survivor support services, legal aid and social welfare, regardless of their residence or migration status;

Fair working conditions and a more equitable distribution of income and wealth

8. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to implement the goal of full and decent employment, as well as adequate social protection, services for all and a fair distribution of income and wealth as a guideline for economic and social policies; calls on the Commission and the Member States, in this context, to strengthen their active labour market policies, in particular for those furthest from employment; emphasises that effective active labour market policies should go beyond access to employment and also include enabling services for people to remain in employment;

9. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to promote policies to protect and promote labour rights, quality jobs, stable employment relationships and protection against unjustified dismissal, fair wages, including equal pay for equal work and equal pay between women and men, lifelong learning, upskilling and reskilling, health and safety in the workplace, non-discrimination and access to adequate social protection; welcomes, in this regard, the announcement of a Quality Jobs Roadmap to ensure a just transition for all workers and self-employed people, notably by increasing collective bargaining coverage; stresses that this roadmap represents an opportunity to establish an individual right to training and lifelong learning; stresses the persistence of in-work poverty for one in twelve workers across the EU; insists, in this context, that there should be no in-work poverty in the EU, and urges the Commission and the Member States to seriously tackle this problem, by addressing structural barriers beyond job quality, including access to and support for childcare services, improving the recognition of qualifications, and addressing the lack of tailored career guidance and training support; stresses that the transposition of Directive (EU) 2022/2041 on adequate minimum wages will be key for preventing and fighting poverty risks among workers, while reinforcing incentives to work;

10. Stresses the need to strengthen democratic participation at work as a tool to combat in-work poverty, through the right to organise and to collective action and enhanced collective bargaining, through trade union rights, namely the freedom to establish and join trade unions, by improving work-life balance and providing fair working conditions, including working time, and by adapting working conditions to human needs;

11. Emphasises the need to strengthen public employment services, training pathways and job-search support systems for people experiencing poverty and for vulnerable groups, particularly long-term unemployed and low-skilled individuals; stresses the importance of individualised guidance, recognition of informal skills and linking training to quality job opportunities; calls on the Member States to ensure the development and expansion of national frameworks for the validation of non-formal and informal learning, enabling the recognition of practical experience in sectors such as construction, agriculture, healthcare and social care, hospitality, manufacturing, artisanal, logistics, and information and communications technology, building on the Council Recommendation of 20 December 2012 on the validation of non-formal and informal learning;

12. Stresses the importance of supporting women’s entrepreneurship and self-employment opportunities, particularly in rural, island and other geographically remote areas, as a means of achieving better economic inclusion and gender equality and combating poverty, creating local employment and fostering inclusive economic development; calls on the Commission and the Member States to ensure targeted support for women entrepreneurs through improved access to funding, business training, digital tools and markets; calls on the Commission to develop policies that facilitate women’s access to quality jobs and entrepreneurial paths, through incentives for companies to hire and promote women, particularly single mothers, and to provide flexible working arrangements;

13. Highlights that segregation in access to mainstream education for children with disabilities results in social exclusion, and remains a challenge across the EU; calls for the anti-poverty strategy to ensure accessibility of education for children with disabilities, both in terms of physical infrastructure and educational resources, in order to guarantee equal opportunities for all pupils; stresses the potential of affordable assistive technologies and artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance inclusive teaching for pupils with disabilities, offering personalised support, adaptive tools and better communication; encourages Member States to invest in these technologies and ensure teachers are trained to integrate them effectively; further calls on the Commission and the Member States to ensure robust safeguards against the misdiagnosis of intellectual disabilities or special education needs among Roma children, which results in educational segregation; stresses the importance of non-discriminatory assessment practices, as well as inclusive education policies that uphold the rights and dignity of all children;

14. Recommends that the Commission and the Member States take into account the approach of the 2023 report of the UN Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights to combat poverty through effective access to work and the goal of full employment and quality jobs, namely by creating or strengthening specific instruments aimed primarily at combating unemployment and underemployment, providing personalised support and increasing the employability of people furthest from the labour market, particularly those from disadvantaged and vulnerable groups, such as Roma people and persons with disabilities; considers that these instruments should take into account the role of both the private and public sectors and the social responsibilities of the Member States;

15. Considers that the social economy is an essential component of the EU’s social market economy and a driver for the implementation of the EPSR and its targets, often providing employment to vulnerable and excluded groups; calls for the anti-poverty strategy to strengthen the social economy in line with the EU’s social economy action plan and the Liège roadmap for social economy in the European Union; reiterates its call for the Commission to explore innovative funding mechanisms, such as social impact bonds, to finance projects to support the development of the social economy in the EU;

16. Calls on the Commission and the Member States, in the light of the cost-of-living crisis, to ensure access to affordable essential goods and services such as food, energy, water, housing, transport and communications;

Access to quality public services, social protection and support measures

17. Urges the Commission and the Member States to combat poverty by promoting public policies that ensure the indivisibility and universality of political, economic, social and cultural rights; insists on the importance of a multidisciplinary approach and on combating poverty and social exclusion, in particular by promoting access to housing, public spaces and services, healthcare, well-being and quality of life; calls on the Member States to develop methodologies for assessing structural or systemic barriers to breaking out of poverty and social exclusion and to participating fully in society, whether these barriers are found in their legal systems, public policies or their implementation at territorial level;

18. Calls for the inclusion of qualitative indicators in the EU anti-poverty strategy to better reflect multidimensional aspects of poverty;

19. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to significantly increase public investment in policies that guarantee social rights, by providing universal access to high-quality public services, and goods and services of general economic and social interest such as decent housing, food, water, sanitation, energy, transport, communications, and cultural and leisure activities; stresses that access to healthy and affordable nutrition is an essential need, particularly for individuals and families experiencing extreme poverty, children, elderly people living alone and marginalised communities; underlines the contribution of such investment to breaking intergenerational cycles of poverty and enabling social and employment inclusion, particularly in areas such as education, including early childhood education and care, healthcare, including mental healthcare, and social protection;

20. Calls on the Commission to support the Member States in promoting a housing policy that ensures universal access to decent and affordable housing, in line with the UN Sustainable Development Goals and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, namely Article 25 thereof, and includes specific action to address homelessness; calls on the Commission to ensure that the European affordable housing plan meets the housing needs of all EU countries, while respecting the principle of subsidiarity, with a particular focus on people experiencing poverty, vulnerable children, young people and marginalised communities; underlines the essential role of affordable and accessible housing in supporting deinstitutionalisation and preventing institutionalisation due to poverty, inadequate housing or lack of support; calls for this plan to dedicate robust EU funding to the expansion and renovation of public and social housing stock; calls for the revision of State aid rules to allow greater investment by the Member States in public and social housing, measures to support social and cooperative housing schemes of the not-for-profit sector and the social economy, and measures to protect tenants, ensuring housing stability, preventing no-fault evictions and to combat speculative practices;

21. Urges the Commission to support the Member States, while respecting the principle of subsidiarity, in implementing and extending programmes and measures, such as Housing First, to address and prevent homelessness, with special attention given to child homelessness, recognising homelessness as one of the most severe and visible forms of poverty and social exclusion; urges the Commission to put forward a robust action plan, with specific targets, with a view to ending homelessness across the EU by 2030, which must include specific measures to prevent homelessness in general, child and family homelessness, homelessness due to job losses and insecure employment conditions in particular, and to tackle female homelessness – often caused by family and domestic violence – as well as measures to improve the accessibility of housing for persons with disabilities and older people;

22. Calls on the Member States to establish and support centres dedicated to homeless individuals, offering basic and specialised medical care tailored to the needs of homeless persons, including physical and mental health services, complemented by educational programmes aimed at preventing drug abuse, including counselling, and skills development initiatives to support reintegration into society; calls on the Commission to provide guidance and facilitate the exchange of best practice among the Member States to ensure the effective and humane operation of these centres;

23. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to adopt effective measures and policies aimed at implementing the principle of ‘equal pay for equal work’, combating inequalities and discrimination in the workplace, particularly those based on gender, racial or ethnic origin, disability, age, socio-economic background, sexual orientation, gender identity or migration status; stresses the importance of a swift implementation of Directive (EU) 2023/970 on equal pay for equal work, and of information campaigns and training on conscious and unconscious biases, in order to prevent such inequalities and discrimination;

24. Calls for new, accelerated efforts to close the gender employment gap and the gender pension gap, and to increase investment in public services and social infrastructure; urges the Commission to encourage the Member States to develop targeted actions to ensure adequate pension levels;

25. Calls on the Member States to develop policies to strengthen maternity, paternity and parental and other carers’ rights, promoting work-life balance, including flexible working-time arrangements, facilitating women’s access to guaranteed income during maternity leave, and supporting women’s reintegration into work after pregnancy and maternity leave, and ensuring adequate conditions for breastfeeding in the workplace; encourages the Member States to introduce and promote accessible and adequately compensated paternity leave policies, enabling fathers to establish strong bonds with their children, equally share caregiving responsibilities, and take necessary time off to support early childhood development and family well-being;

26. Highlights the disproportionate impact of unpaid care work on women and on their economic security; calls on the Member States to reinforce their public national and regional care systems to ensure that all individuals, both older and younger, regardless of their background, have access to professional care services that guarantee good working conditions for care professionals; highlights that home care services are essential to providing quality, person-centred care for people in need, including older people, as well as high-quality childcare; encourages the Member States to explore the possibility of adopting practices and measures that provide support to informal carers, particularly those caring for individuals from low-income households, who, following professional assessment, are deemed unable to live independently, as a means of supporting dignified, community-based care;

27. Calls on the Members States to develop policies and access to returnship support for workers, especially women who have been out of the workforce for a number of years due to family responsibilities;

28. Urges the Member States to ensure universal access to affordable, high-quality public healthcare for all, including prenatal, maternal, neonatal and paediatric healthcare – including primary prevention, vaccination programmes and primary care – access to diagnosis, treatment and rehabilitation, and access to a diverse range of medical and therapeutic specialist treatments, guaranteeing all women the right to sexual and reproductive healthcare, in addition to targeted measures to ensure early identification and intervention for those at risk of health and developmental issues, and also to improve targeted early childhood intervention services aimed at promoting the development, well-being and social inclusion of children;

30. Calls on the Member States to strengthen public, universal and solidarity-based social security systems in order to ensure full and effective social protection for all, including workers, the self-employed and pensioners, and to prevent and address the root causes of poverty and in-work poverty, in line with the 2019 Council Recommendation on access to social protection for workers and the self-employed; insists on the importance of addressing the challenges faced by people in precarious or non-standard employment, particularly young people facing age discrimination and lacking sufficient contribution records to access social security benefits, and including artists and workers in the cultural and creative sectors; calls on the Member States to address poverty among the elderly through specific measures, with particular attention to women, who are disproportionately affected; calls on the Member States to adequately take into account, in their pension schemes, periods of absence from work due to parental leave;

31. Stresses that the informal economy should be addressed in the anti-poverty strategy, given that it remains widespread throughout the EU, resulting in jobs without access to rights, adequate pay, social protection, or health and safety standards at work; encourages the Member States to create inclusion pathways between the informal and formal economies, for example by introducing simplified registration procedures for seasonal, manual and domestic workers;

32. Calls on the Member States to address youth poverty and socio-economic inequality, recognising that young people are disproportionately affected by unemployment, precarious employment, housing exclusion and social vulnerability; stresses that young people are overrepresented in sectors characterised by part-time, seasonal, precarious and undeclared work, and that rates of young people not in education, employment or training remain persistently high in several Member States and more than twice as high as the overall EU unemployment rate; highlights the need to strengthen the Youth Guarantee as a key instrument for promoting the inclusion of young people in the labour market, as well as the need to use the strategy to develop more synergies between this instrument and the European Child Guarantee, and to strengthen both instruments by adopting targeted measures, advancing affordable housing solutions for young people within the upcoming affordable housing plan, and enhancing tailored mental health support and social inclusion services specifically designed for young people; calls for strengthened support for young people transitioning out of alternative care, to ensure a stable and dignified path into adulthood, namely by providing enhanced access to training and employment opportunities, or support with university or vocational education and training, in order to reduce the risk of poverty, social exclusion and homelessness during this critical period;

33. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to consider the hidden phenomena of poverty, to combat the stigmatisation of people living in poverty, and the non-take-up of available social benefits;

35. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to revise relevant legislation in order to explicitly prohibit discrimination based on socio-economic status, recognising its intersection with other forms of discrimination; underlines that a clear legal basis is necessary to ensure enforceable rights and protection for people experiencing poverty and social exclusion; further calls on the Council to adopt its position on the horizontal anti-discrimination directive in order to launch interinstitutional negotiations;

36. Calls on the Member States to review policies and measures that penalise people experiencing extreme poverty, and the sanctions against those providing support; emphasises that such measures often undermine dignity, worsen exclusion and are counterproductive to long-term social inclusion objectives;

37. Urges the Member States to explore and implement proactive mechanisms to ensure that all individuals eligible for social benefits, especially those in groups targeted for social assistance, are informed effectively of and granted access to them, thereby reducing non-take-up, including by reducing the administrative burden of benefit claims, ensuring more transparency, and ensuring that staff are trained to reach out to and assist people experiencing poverty, in order to build trust in the relevant institutions;

38. Regrets that the target of the EU Roma Strategic Framework 2021-2030 on reducing the poverty gap between Roma communities and the general population by at least half is still far from being reached; highlights that the EU anti-poverty strategy should share the common goal of promoting fundamental rights, reducing inequality and addressing structural discrimination with the EU Roma Strategic Framework and the European Child Guarantee; underlines the importance of ensuring that these initiatives are implemented in synergy, particularly in tackling child poverty and breaking the cycle of intergenerational disadvantage among Roma families and traveller communities;

39. Stresses the growing digital divide, which can deepen poverty by limiting access to information, and the need for measures to address the digital exclusion of low-income and marginalised groups, including older people; calls, in this regard, on the Commission and the Member States to foster the digital inclusion of vulnerable groups through measures and support programmes ensuring their access to digital technologies, infrastructure and connectivity, as well as training on basic digital skills; recommends the inclusion of clear indicators to monitor digital inclusion, especially among children, while continuing to safeguard their online activity and that of teenagers;

40. Considers that the target of the full digitalisation of key public services set out in the EU’s Digital Decade policy programme can accentuate inequalities, particularly between urban and rural areas, age groups and socio-economic groups, by moving away from individualised support; stresses, in this regard, the need to strike a balance between the process of digitalisation of public services and administration, and the needs of vulnerable groups; calls on the Commission and the Member States to address this issue in the context of the anti-poverty strategy and national action plans, ensuring the necessary resources, in-person support and proper training for staff in key public administration services, to ensure equal access to public services and prevent the widening of the digital divide;

41. Recalls that the increasing use of algorithms and AI systems in essential public services can pose significant risks of reinforcing existing forms of discrimination, particularly against people experiencing poverty; urges the Commission, in this regard, to promote AI systems that are ethical by design and to ensure the horizontal principle of non-discrimination in all EU regulations relating to AI;

42. Stresses the fact that poverty and mental health are closely intertwined and that each can negatively affect the other; recommends that the Member States strengthen support for people, including families and children in vulnerable situations, through mental health and psychosocial support services, and ensure the deployment of sufficient resources and adequately trained professionals to provide these services effectively;

43. Stresses the importance of ensuring the right for everyone to access, create and participate in culture, and of eliminating economic, social and territorial discrimination in access to culture;

44. Highlights that people at risk of poverty and social exclusion are disproportionately impacted by climate change; reiterates that the green and digital transitions must be socially fair and inclusive; calls for the EU anti-poverty strategy to incorporate adequate and targeted measures that reinforce and complement efforts towards a just transition, ensuring a comprehensive approach to tackling social and economic inequalities; urges the Commission to commit sufficient funding in the 2028-2034 MFF for investments in supporting people during these transitions, with particular attention to low-income households;

45. Stresses that people living in rural areas, remote communities and areas with a low density of public services are more vulnerable to falling into poverty and experiencing social exclusion due to a lack of employment opportunities, public services (including education and public transport), digital connectivity, and high energy and transport prices; calls for the specific needs of people living in these areas to be considered in the anti-poverty strategy;

A strategy with child poverty at its core

46. Deplores the fact that the number of children at risk of poverty and social exclusion has increased; calls on the Commission to ensure that the anti-poverty strategy actively combats child poverty through a life-cycle approach, considering that the first years of children’s lives are crucial to their physical, mental, cognitive, social and emotional development, and to their lifelong fulfilment, in order to break the cycle of intergenerational poverty;

52. Reiterates its call on the Commission to carefully monitor the implementation of the European Child Guarantee in all of the Member States, as part of the European Semester and country-specific recommendations; considers that the country-specific recommendations should reflect Member States’ budgetary compliance with the minimum requirement of allocation for tackling child poverty set out in the ESF+ Regulation;

53. Urges the Member States to ensure the provision of quality childcare accessible to all, with the aim of supporting early childhood education and care as crucial drivers in breaking the cycle of poverty and increasing parents’ participation in the labour market, recognising that caregiving responsibilities disproportionately fall on women;

54. Calls on the Member States to ensure a child-focused orientation in their social protection systems and to strengthen them by providing specific benefits for children in need, to support their development and well-being, such as child allowances, school meals and cost-reduction programmes for cultural, sport, leisure and extracurricular activities;

55. Stresses that children affected by poverty and social exclusion face difficulties in various areas of their development; emphasises, in this regard, the importance of a multisectoral approach, in which all relevant stakeholders work in partnership to develop an integrated strategy to identify difficulties and combat inequalities in childhood, providing child protection and family support services; highlights that some children and their families affected by poverty may need specific support, e.g. from speech therapists, ophthalmologists, psychologists, occupational therapists and nutritionists; calls for the anti-poverty strategy to actively promote partnerships between educational, healthcare and social services in order to facilitate access to care and the transfer of information between services, with a view to improving integrated support and coordination mechanisms for children in need;

56. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to ensure every child’s right to family life, meaning that poverty, precarious housing situations or lack of access to adequate public services are never used as the sole grounds for placing children in institutional care; recommends that the Member States develop national prevention strategies and proactive social policies to prevent the separation of children from their family environment; calls on the Member States to ensure that recourse to institutionalising children and young people is treated as a last resort, and to invest in safe foster care systems for children and young people to ease the transition from institutional care to family and community-based care; recommends that the Member States design and implement monitoring mechanisms to identify poverty-related family separation;