CNV argues in favor of giving every Dutch person €1000 training money from the cabinet this year. The union advocates this in a manifesto, which will be presented to Minister of Social Affairs Karien van Gennip on Tuesday. According to the union, this one-time investment could yield tens of billions of euros in returns.
“The Netherlands is facing an increasing shortage of qualified personnel. With a starting budget of 1000 euros, everyone has the opportunity to develop quickly and to be ready for the labor market of the future,” says CNV chairman Piet Fortuin.
The CNV is critical of the current STAP budget that the cabinet makes available to workers. Only 160,000 people can use this and it is precisely the group that can use it the most that is missing out. The union advocates that the €1000 be deposited into a separate learning account.
learning account
According to the CNV, half a million workers already have a learning account. “We want everyone in the Netherlands to receive a learning account: a personal training pot through which people can follow a course of their own choice.” For only 6% of workers, the employer currently pays for training outside their own field, the union states.
Work is changing faster and faster and 85% of workers indicate that their work has changed in the past ten years, according to research by the union. Developments such as digitization and automation play a major role in this, in addition to the energy transition.
Revenue
Training results in a higher effectiveness due to the newly acquired qualifications and therefore also a higher salary on average. Certainly if the training focuses on analytical skills, which the future labor market demands.
“In the long run, the yields could be even higher than we are now calculating. People are getting a taste of education. Employers see the extra returns and are willing to invest extra on that basis. The snowball effect. In short, only profit,” says Fortuin.