Professor Hildegard Schneider
|
|
In European law and more specifically with regard to the recognition of professional qualifications, the decisions taken by the competent authorities should be based on mutual trust. Mutual trust in the quality of the professional education in the other Member State has been the basis for the European legislature in this area and for guaranteeing the mobility of professionals across the EU.
Diplomas and qualifications should in principle be recognized. The leading notion is to recognize, unless...The standard approach today, however, seems to lean towards finding the exemption, rather than direct recognition.
I find this strange. Every day we allow non-residents to drive all across the Netherlands on a driver’s licence from another country. Are they as qualified as Dutch drivers? We don’t know, yet we trust them to drive safely. Then, when it comes to working in the Netherlands with foreign qualifications, our trust vanishes overnight, and we start arguing about individual courses or lectures that should have been offered more extensively. And why? Because we worry that the person with a foreign qualification may not work safely or do it right? In the end, isn’t having so many travellers with foreign driver’s licences on our roads every day potentially much more dangerous? In short, let trust be the basic concept instead of suspicion, especially when it comes to the recognition of qualifications.
|
|
|
|
|
ITEM's Cross border impact assessment 2017
|
|
|
What are the effects of new legislation on border regions? And how does existing law affect border regions?
ITEM investigates these questions in its annual cross-border impact assessment. The activities for ITEM's 2017 Cross-border Impact assessment are in full swing. Click here to see the provisional 2017 dossier selection.
ITEM’s first Cross-border Impact Assessment was published in 2016. The study included 10 dossiers, involved 19 researchers and has resulted in over 300 pages of valuable research for border regions. The Cross-border Impact Assessment 2016 featured subjects ranging from taxation to road tolls and highlighted the border effects of existing and prospective legislation. However, things did not stop there. The ITEM Cross-border Impact Assessment 2016 has proven to be the basis for further action and research aimed at improving cross-border labour mobility.
|
Read more
|
|
|
|
|
|
Beyond the refugee crisis
|
|
When it comes to topical issues, ITEM keeps its finger on the pulse. Although the refugee crisis has been going on for quite some time, the issue remains strongly present in the news. Where the discussion was initially aimed at the reception of refugees and the processing of asylum applications, it is now shifting to other themes, such as integration.
In this context, ITEM PhD candidates have taken the initiative to write about the refugee crisis. ITEM is pleased to announce their publication “Beyond the Refugee Crisis: A reflection from different perspectives on the Dutch case”.
This ITEM PhD Volume concerns the topic of the refugee crisis as experienced by the Netherlands. It features different perspectives and consists of separate contributions of the PhD candidates involved. Each of them has tackled the topic of the refugee crisis from their own area of interest. The volume therefore discusses themes ranging from migration law and criminal behaviour to social security.
This exploratory work is aimed at a wide variety of stakeholders and can be read without extensive prior knowledge. The ITEM PhD candidates hope the Volume provides valuable insight and will inspire further research into the refugee crisis.
|
Read more
|
|
|
|
|
Results of ITEM research on 'cross-border employment'
|
|
Citizens of the European Union are entitled to look for employment in another member state, subject to the same local legislation applied to the workers of that state. This right is supplemented by a sort of entitlement to 'job placement' in other member states. Offering such services in a transnational context requires the cooperation of national public employment services, however.
This cooperation was explicitly prescribed in 2016 by the new EURES-directive (EU) 2016/589. It outlines a European network of public employment services that 'afford workers and employees access to mobility-promoting services.' After many years of EURES cooperation, the focus is now on what EURES is actually accomplishing and what it might accomplish in the future.
|
Read more
|
|
|
|
|
|
ITEM/ICGI starts new research project on cross-border corporate mobility in the EU
|
|
ITEM’s Marcus Meyer and Thomas Biermeyer have won a tender from the European TradeUnion Institute for a three-year project on cross-border corporate mobility in the European Union and the European Economic Area.
The topic of cross-border company mobility has been on the EU legislator’s agenda for several decades. However, only in the last decade has EU integration accelerated in this area through the creation of European corporate legal forms, such as the European Company (Societas Europaea, SE), legislation on cross-border mergers, the Cross-Border Mergers Directive and the case-law of the Court of Justice of the European Union.
|
Read more
|
|
|
|
|
Multilingualism in the workplace
|
|
25 years ago, the birth act of the European Union was signed in Maastricht. A historic moment, which brought the capital of the Dutch province of Limburg international fame. Yet, Maastricht and Limburg could profit much more from ‘Europe’ than happens today. Language still forms an obstacle though. A new project from research institute ITEM further explores this issue.
When walking through the shopping streets of Maastricht, you can hear a great variety of languages. The proximity of the Belgian border makes the city attractive for Flemish and Walloon shoppers. And of course there is Maastricht University, where students from all over the world meet.
Yet, for many inhabitants of Maastricht and the South Limburg region, it is no obvious choice still to study an entire degree programme in another country. Also when it comes to job-seeking, few people cross the Dutch border. It turns out that even for entrepreneurs, the border can still be a real obstacle sometimes.
|
Read more
|
|
|
|
|
Cross-border internships in the Mheuse Rhine Euregion
|
|
ITEM recently started a research project about cross-border internships in the Meuse-Rhine Euregion. The aim of this project is to make an inventory of the success factors or obstacles for students wanting to do an internship in the Meuse-Rhine Euregion.
The research is particularly aimed at institutions of senior secondary vocational education (MBO). Commissioned by the Meuse-Rhine Euregion and EURES, this project will be carried out and led by ITEM's 'ontgrenzer' Martin Unfried between March 2017 and July 2017.
|
Read more
|
|
|
|
|
Feasibility study 'cross-border professional recognition card'
|
|
ITEM has started its feasibility study into a cross-border professional recognition card. Previous research indicated that the national legislation in the area of the recognition of qualifications appears to be implemented properly. Practice nevertheless paints a different picture.
ITEM examines the feasibility of a cross-border professional recognition card in the Meuse-Rhine Euregion, in order to acknowledge the unique situation of frontier workers in recognition procedures. The objective is to form an instrument that instantly allows for cross-border working.
|
Read more
|
|
|
|
|
ITEM puts critical questions to governments
|
|
Life certificate - enjoying your pension abroad
|
|
People who wish to receive their pension abroad have to annually present a life certificate or proof of life to both the Dutch social security bank SVB for their AOW state pension and to their Dutch private pension fund(s) for their occupational pension(s).
Mobile pensioners who enjoy their pensions abroad thus make use of their guaranteed European freedoms to reside, work and settle elsewhere in the European Union. Besides constituting an administrative hurdle for cross-border mobility, this annually recurring obligation constitutes an impediment to exercising these European freedoms. Read more about this in the ITEM-blog Life certificates: a barrier to the free movement of pensioners.
|
Read more
|
|
|
|
|
|
Institute for Transnational and Euregional cross border cooperation and Mobility / ITEM
E-mail: item@maastrichtuniversity.nl
Website: www.maastrichtuniversity.nl/item
Twitter: @ITEM_UM
Telephone: 0031 – 43 3883233
Address:
Bouillonstraat 1-3, 6211 LH Maastricht, The Netherlands
Avenue Céramique 50, 6221 KV Maastricht, The Netherlands (Tuesday and Thursday)
|
|
|
|
|
|