European Union

On Wednesday, MEPs called for democratic oversight of tech giants to safeguard freedom of expression.
Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs

Source : © European Union, 2021 - EP

The implementation of ARTUS, a project selected under the 2019 call for proposals for the EU Preparatory Action on Defence Research (PADR) managed by EDA, was officially launched at an online kick-off meeting held on 10 February 2021. 

ARTUS stands for ‘Autonomous Rough-terrain Transport UGV Swarm’. The project, with a budget of approximately €1.5 million, was selected following an EU-wide PADR call for proposals on the topic of ‘Future Disruptive Defence Technologies - Emerging Game-changers’, sub-topic ‘Augmenting Soldier Capacity’. 

ARTUS aims at developing a technological feasibility concept and demonstrator for a small swarm of intelligent and autonomously operating Unmanned Ground Vehicles (UGVs) to support infantry platoons during their missions. The supporting swarm will significantly augment their capacity by: providing substantially added payload for the entire equipment through harsh environments, including densely wooded or sloped areas; reacting autonomously to unexpected developments, such as losses of parts of the swarm; increasing the unit's mobility and flexibility; and increasing the overall protection level of the troops.

The consortium is led by Fraunhofer Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Angewandten Forschung E.V. (Germany) and also encompasses ONERA (France), another well-established R&T organisation, Diehl Defence (Germany), a global player in defence systems, and charismaTec (Austria), a highly innovative SME. The project has a duration of 24 months. 

More information on the consortium can be found on the ARTUS project page.

About the PADR

The ARTUS project is part of the Preparatory Action on Defence Research (PADR) launched by the European Commission in 2017 to assess and demonstrate the added-value of EU supported defence research and technology (R&T). It paved the way for a proper European Defence Programme to come as part of the European Defence Fund (EDF), under the EU’s Multiannual Financial Framework (2021-2027).
The PADR implementation is run by EDA following the mandate via a Delegation Agreement between the European Commission and EDA signed on 31 May 2017. By this agreement the Commission entrusts EDA with the management and implementation of the research projects launched within the PADR.  

 

MEPs called on the EU to step up its efforts to regulate social media while safeguarding freedom of speech and avoiding censorship.

Source : © European Union, 2021 - EP

MEPs called on the EU to step up its efforts to regulate social media while safeguarding freedom of speech and avoiding censorship.

Source : © European Union, 2021 - EP

Raising awareness of a critical issue too early may prove to be counterproductive, either because short-sighted politicians focus on short-term interests or because they simply do not see what is coming up.

Lawmakers in the European Parliament adopted a set of ambitious proposals on the EU’s circular economy action plan on Tuesday (9 February), including calls to introduce mandatory targets to reduce waste.

The European Commission wants to promote a "strong social dimension" at the May summit in Porto, as part of the Portuguese EU Council presidency, advocating a focus on young people who are facing a "difficult period" due to the COVID-19 crisis​​​​​​​.

Written by Miroslava Karaboytcheva (1st edition),

© gustavofrazao / Adobe Stock

In response to the coronavirus pandemic, on 28 May 2020 the Commission adopted a proposal for a regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council establishing a Recovery and Resilience Facility (the Facility). The Facility will provide €672.5 billion in loans and grants over the coming years to help mitigate the consequences of the pandemic across the EU and to make EU economies more sustainable. The Facility will disburse funds based on the achievement of a set of milestones and targets.

The Parliament’s Committees on Budgets and on Economic and Monetary Affairs have been working jointly on the file, and adopted their report in November 2020. In December 2020, the Parliament and the Council reached an agreement on the Facility in trilogue. The Parliament is expected to vote at first reading on the agreed text during its February 2021 plenary session.

Complete version

• Recovery and Resilience Facility (1st edition)

Proposal for a regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on amending Regulation (EC) No 1367/2006 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 6 September 2006 on the application of the provisions of the Aarhus Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters to Community institutions and bodies Committee responsible: Budgets (BUDG) and Economic and Monetary Affairs (ECON), jointly under Rule 58 COM(2020) 408 final
28.5.2020 Rapporteur: Siegfried Mureşan (EPP, Romania);
Eider Gardiazabal Rubial (S&D, Spain); 2020/0289(COD) Shadow rapporteurs: José Manuel Fernández (EPP, Portugal)
Costas Mavrides (S&D, Cyprus)
Luis Garicano (Renew, Spain)
Joachim Kuhs (ID, Germany)
Antonio Maria Rinaldi (ID, Italy)
Damian Boeselager (Greens/EFA, Germany)
Ernest Urtasun (Greens/EFA, Spain)
Johan Van Overtveldt (ECR, Belgium)
Roberts Zīle (ECR, Latvia)
José Gusmão (The Left, Portugal)
Dimitrios Papadimoulis (The Left, Greece) Ordinary legislative procedure (COD) (Parliament and Council on equal footing – formerly ‘co-decision’) Next steps expected: First-reading vote in plenary

Written by Mihalis Kritikos,

© Adobe Stock

Technological change, far from being deterministic in its nature and effects, is open to reform. There is no guarantee that digital technologies will destroy jobs, nor any certainty that these technologies will lead to more and better jobs.

This was one of the main conclusions of the study ‘Digital automation and the future of work: Securing a digital future that works for all’, which was carried out by Professor David Spencer of the University of Leeds at the request of the STOA Panel, following a proposal from STOA Chair Eva Kaili (S&D, Greece).

Although new technologies can lead to economic growth, job creation and demand for new specialist skills, they can also displace entire tasks and professions, modify the nature and structure of jobs and create a polarised economy. This is fuelled by the dominant perception that today’s technological change is faster-paced and broader-based than in the past, automating many more jobs than previously thought. As technological breakthroughs rapidly shift the frontier between the work tasks performed by humans and those performed by algorithms, labour markets are undergoing major transformations. The changing nature of work may undermine the protection of labour rights, lead certain types of workers to long-term unemployment, and create job polarisation and societal discontent. If not managed carefully, these transformations, exacerbated by the ongoing Covid‑19 crisis that has impacted millions of low-skilled workers, pose the risk of further widening skills gaps and existing inequalities.

Will artificial intelligence (AI) technologies benefit the labour market and job creation over the next decade and beyond, or will they aggravate it by replacing humans? Is the ongoing technological disruption going to lead to extensive technological unemployment or have labour-augmenting effects? Are all stakeholders adequately prepared to tackle the challenges of the ongoing increase of automation in the workplace and strengthen existing safety nets in view of the coronavirus pandemic and its unprecedented social and economic consequences?

This new STOA study provides a timely, in-depth overview of the nature, scope and possible effects of digital automation. It reviews relevant literature and recognises that the impacts of technological change on work and employment are multifaceted. The report addresses the nature, scope and possible effects of digital automation and situates modern debates on technological change in historical context. The report recognises that technological change can affect not just the volume of work but also its quality.

According to the study findings, the effects of digital technologies will depend on the relative strength of any job displacement effect and digital automation will have a more complex and gradual effect on occupations than simply wholesale job destruction. By looking at the history of technological change, the author argues that, despite the effects upon the type and often the content of work on offer, no technological revolution has led to any lessening in the work we are required to do.

On the one hand, it is argued that technology may help to improve skills and raise the quality of work, leading to upskilling and improvement in the quality of jobs. At the same time, digital technologies, and AI in particular, can lead to skill gaps, greater inequality and a more polarised society by de‑skilling and creating and embedding low-paid, low-autonomy work. They can also erode job quality by eliminating valuable skills, intensifying monitoring at work, and extending atypical work.

The study puts forward the issue of the broader economic and social context within which technology is developed, applied and controlled as an important parameter in the analysis of the effects of digital technologies upon the future of work. The author stresses the need for wider reforms that go beyond the existing skills-focused agenda and are inclusive of work time reduction, so that the benefits of digital automation can be more widely shared. The study’s recognition of the need for better active labour market policies as well as for better involvement of and working together between employment services, skills providers, social services and business is of significant policy relevance.

The report adds to the current debates by suggesting policy options that are forward-looking in that they not only complement existing policies, but also propose elements of a digital social contract that could promote an inclusive future of work. These refer to the need for digital upskilling for working in AI-enhanced environments, and a reduction of the EU Working-Time Directive to 38 hours per week and removal of the opt-out clause. The study argues for greater worker representation and more democratic workplace governance and the adoption at the EU level of a strategic, mission-oriented approach to digital automation to ensure decent work objectives are achieved. The proposed policy options go beyond the commonly framed suggestions for enhancing skills and training and seek a human-centred approach to digital transformations of work based on industrial democracy and social partnership.

The study is expected to steer the debate around the labour market impact of AI and through its analytical lenses to offer considerable evidence to respond to the ongoing challenges related to the precariousness of today’s jobs. Given that the Covid‑19 crisis has further increased the gap between the most privileged and the most vulnerable and has accelerated digital disruption, the study’s balanced approach may prove vital in helping to prepare a more inclusive digital future, in adapting EU policies to the changing reality in the world of work, and in exploring how to best harness such changes for the benefit of our societies. The ongoing technological change needs to be managed in a proactive and worker-centric manner: the study’s findings can support EU policy-makers in visualising labour reforms that are inclusive and would enable the net benefits of digital automation to be realised and more widely shared.

Read the full report and accompanying STOA Options Brief to find out more.

Your opinion counts for us. To let us know what you think, get in touch via stoa@europarl.europa.eu

The EU must continue its concerted efforts to fight the COVID-19 pandemic and take urgent measures to ramp up vaccines production to meet citizens’ expectations, MEPs say.
Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety

Source : © European Union, 2021 - EP

The EU must continue its concerted efforts to fight the COVID-19 pandemic and take urgent measures to ramp up vaccines production to meet citizens’ expectations, MEPs say.
Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety

Source : © European Union, 2021 - EP

While European lawmakers were scolding the bloc's top diplomat Josep Borrell for his ill-fated trip to Russia, European Council President Charles Michel has announced he will be travelling to Ukraine and Georgia in March -- both countries in conflict over their territory with the Kremlin -- "to stress the EU’s position of support to their sovereignty and territorial integrity."

The EU should prohibit targeted advertising as part of new rules against Big Tech platforms in the bloc's Digital Services Act, the EU's institutional data protection watchdog has said.

The head of the French state-controlled energy group, EDF, defended a planned restructuring of the company, dubbed 'Project Hercules' on Wednesday (10 February), as a spat grows between France and the European Union over the future of the company.

Lawmakers in the European Parliament voted to pass the EU's €672.5 recovery and resilience facility on Tuesday evening (9 February), unlocking unprecedented funding aimed at helping Europe "build back better" after the COVID-19 crisis.

Together with 50 Democratic senators, six Republicans have voted in favour of going ahead with an impeachment trial against Donald Trump after his term in office ended. For Trump to be found guilty of "incitement of insurrection" at least 17 Republicans would have to vote with the Democrats. Europe's press discusses why this is unlikely and what it says about the state of the Grand Old Party.