A socially inclusive Europe is a precondition for successfully combatting climate change. Climate change is a defining challenge of our time. How we manage this challenge will determine our future. The social and economic costs of climate inaction are unacceptable. More severe and frequent droughts, wildfires and coastal and river flooding are already causing dislocation and hardship. Our new 2019 ‘Employment and Social Developments in Europe’ report reaffirms that up to two per cent of the European Union’s GDP could be lost annually due to global warming. 

These are the impacts that can be measured. How do you quantify the loss of the home in which you grew up? What is the socio-economic cost of the decline of a species, such as honeybees, that has evolved for millions of years and is fundamental to our biodiversity? 

Climate inaction is simply not an option. That is why the European Union is a global leader in sustainable development and the fight against climate change. All of the EU’s 28 member states are implementing the 2015 Paris Agreement, and the large majority are willing to pledge to become carbon-neutral by 2050. Finland wants to reach this goal already by 2035. 

The transition to a green economy, however, will not be socially inclusive by default. Many Europeans are worried about the expected rise in energy costs and its impact on their disposable income at the end of the month. The number of people in the EU with arrears in their utility bills has gone down in recent years but nearly 50 million are still affected. That is 50 million too many.  

It is becoming increasingly clear that the success of our climate strategy demands that these policies are inclusive. This means integrating the social dimension in our climate policies from the outset, not as an afterthought. 

The recent protests in France, following the raising of road fuel prices, show just how difficult it can be to get your national mix of climate policies right. Equally sharing the costs and benefits of decarbonisation, and paying particular attention to the most vulnerable in our societies, is essential if we want the green transition to be just and democratic. This also means explicitly reinvesting revenues from carbon pricing into redistributive social policies. 

Equally sharing the costs and benefits of decarbonisation… is essential if we want the green transition to be just and democratic

I know that digital transformation brings challenges as well as opportunities. Contrary to warnings by technophobes and technophiles alike, the future of work does not spell the end of work. Some jobs will disappear, new jobs will be created, and many existing jobs will change. The same is true for the green transition. 

Between 2000 and 2015, EU employment grew at a faster rate in the environmental sector than in the economy overall. Most green jobs are middle-income and middle-skilled, countering the labour market polarisation that we see due to digitisation and automation. If Europe remains a leader in green technologies, the employment windfalls will be even higher. 

Investing in this future means not only investing in innovation and job creation but also in people and their skills. It means supporting and enabling people by updating our social security systems for the 21st century. When we launched the European Pillar of Social Rights in 2017 in Gothenburg, Sweden, we made this commitment to the EU’s citizens. No one is to be left behind. 

The New Skills Agenda for Europe is already bearing fruit. The European Commission is working closely with national governments to invest in digital skills, vocational education and training, and lifelong learning. Through the EU’s structural and investment funds, like the European Social Fund (ESF), EU regions can finance reforms that are socially inclusive, green and forward looking. 

We cannot overlook the territorial dimension of the green transition. That is why the Coal Regions in Transition programme is piloting projects in 14 regions across the EU. The Commission has also proposed that the European Globalisation Fund (EGF) could finance retraining and activation of workers who lose their jobs due to decarbonisation. 

The just transition to a green economy will be a cornerstone of the next Commission’s mandate. For the green transition to be politically legitimate, integrating the human impact into the very design of our policies is decisive. It is imperative that we act now. 

Marianne Thyssen is the EU Commissionerfor Employment, Social Affairs, Skills and Labour Mobility.