Samenvatting

The European Social Fund, ESF, along with the European Regional Development Fund and the Cohesion Fund is part of the European Structural Funds. These Funds are created to narrow the differences in living standards and prosperity throughout the European Union.
Since 1957, the aim of the European Social Fund has remained focused on providing better jobs and social benefits for workers. The ESF target group is very broad and consists of different kinds of people that have one thing in common; their weak position in the labour market. In order to reach the right target group, ESF is working together with educational development funds, municipalities, the Employee Insurance Agency (UWV) and institutions that are involved with the target group.
ESF operated based on a seven year cycle. The EU sets a framework with different policy goals that member states should focus on. The Netherlands receives € 830 million over the current period (January 2007 until 31st of December 2013) and uses ESF to create better opportunities for the unemployed , and for employees to take additional training. The ESF budget is spread over three priorities. Within these three priorities there are different projects that are especially aimed at different unemployed target groups. It should be noticed that the ESF system is based on co-financing projects. The reason that those projects are not entirely subsidised is that the project initiative should be motivated to start the project and that the fund should be a stimulant to the extra cost the initiative has.The Netherlands receive some of their contribution back through subsidies such as the Structural Funds. Nevertheless, ESF is not meant as a financial compensation from Brussels. The member states need to co-finance ESF as well. Unfortunately, the administration process of receiving the ESF is strict and complex.Therefore, media attention on this has been negative throughout previous periods.
The plans for the new ESF period 2014 - 2020 differ from those of the current period. The first reason for this is the fact that the budget is € 420 million, which is half of the budget available for the current period. The plan is to have one priority: active inclusion and different actions that are part of this. There is a national budget available to co-finance the ESF in 2014 and 2015. From 2016 until 2020, ESF will have a new priority involving employment support of labour limited people. The reason for this priority is that national budget will be available from 2016 onwards.
The main research question for this final project is: what is the added value of ESF in the Netherlands and how can the image be improved? To answer this question different analysis had to be conducted.
The different recommendations are divided into primary and secondary recommendations.
The main primary recommendation is to organise a kick-off day to introduce the new 2014 - 2020 programme to which different media should be invited in order to understand what the ESF is and what the new programme includes.
The website of the Agentschap SZW should be made more attractive and provide better information. The internal communication of the Agentschap SZW should be improved by training. The reason for this is that applicants have complaints that there is no personal touch in the ESF project. Also the contact persons of the Agentschap SZW frequently change jobs and the new contact person is not well informed.
The secondary recommendations involve improving communications with the contact persons of the Agentschap SZW. The long-term recommendation would be to research what the benefits are of leaving the middlemen out and how to facilitate an easier and digital administration process.