The European Social Charter, the human rights treaty on social and economic rights, guarantees the right to be protected against poverty and social exclusion through its Article 30, as it is considered that living in a situation of poverty and social exclusion violates the dignity of human beings. Article 30 of the Charter is the first binding human rights provision in Europe for the protection against poverty and social exclusion. The primary obligation for States Parties under Article 30 of the Charter is the adoption of a comprehensive and co-ordinated approach which explicitly aims at combating poverty and social exclusion by adopting measures aimed at preventing and removing obstacles to access to fundamental social rights, in particular employment, housing, training, education, culture and social and medical assistance.

The European Committee of Social Rights (ECSR) monitors the implementation of the Charter, not only in law, but also in practice.

In light of this approach, assessments of situations under Article 30, as for other substantial provisions of the Charter, are based on this human rights approach, which has been reaffirmed by the Guiding Principles on extreme poverty and human rights (submitted by the Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, Magdalena Sepúlveda Carmona, and adopted by the United Nations Human Rights Council on 27 September 2012) and which has consistently been applied by the ECSR. In particular, the ECSR has interpreted the scope of Article 30 of the Charter as relating both to protection against poverty (understood as involving situations of social precarity) and protection against social exclusion (understood as involving obstacles to inclusion and citizen participation) in an autonomous manner or in combination with other connecting provisions of the Charter.

In its Conclusions 2019, the European Committee of Social Rights highlighted the issue of child poverty under Article 17 of the European Social Charter. The Committee pointed out that the prevalence of child poverty in a State Party, whether defined or measured in either monetary or multidimensional terms, is an important indicator of the effectiveness of state efforts to ensure the right of children and young persons to social, legal and economic protection. The obligation of States Parties to take all appropriate and necessary measures to ensure that children and young persons have the assistance they need is strongly linked to measures directed towards the amelioration and eradication of child poverty and social exclusion. Therefore, the Committee will take child poverty levels into account when considering the state’s obligations in terms of Article 17 of the Charter.

The Committee asked that the next national reports on the implementation of Article 17 of the ESC provide information on the measures adopted to reduce child poverty, including non-monetary measures such as ensuring access to quality and affordable services in the areas of health, education, housing etc. Information should also be provided on measures focused on combatting discrimination against and promoting equal opportunities for children from particularly vulnerable groups such as ethnic minorities, Roma children, children with disabilities, and children in care. States Parties should also make clear the extent to which child participation is ensured in work directed towards combatting child poverty and social exclusion.

Regarding the detection of child labour and illegally working children (Article 7 of the Charter), the Committee noted that many states’ legislation is in conformity with the Charter regarding the minimum age for employment. Nevertheless, the Committee is concerned about the situation in practice. There is data that suggests that in many countries there is a significant number of children working illegally. However, there is little official data on the extent of the problem. Therefore, in its Conclusions 2019, the Committee requested all states to provide information on the measures taken by the authorities (e.g. Labour Inspectorates and social services) to detect child labour, including children working in the informal economy. In this regard, the Committee asked all states to provide information on the number of children actually working (either from existing statistics on this issue or from surveys to be conducted to obtain such information), as well as on measures taken to identify and monitor sectors where it is strongly suspected that children are working illegally.

Furthermore, the ECSR emphasises the very close link between the effectiveness of the right recognised by Article 30 of the Charter and the enjoyment of the rights recognised by other provisions, such as the right to work (Article 1), access to health care (Article 11), social security allowances (Article 12), social and medical assistance (Article 13), the benefit from social welfare services (Article 14), the rights of persons with disabilities (Article 15), the social, legal and economic protection of the family (Article 16) as well as of children and young persons (Article 17), the right to equal opportunities and equal treatment in employment and occupation without sex discrimination (Article 20), the rights of the elderly (Article 23) or the right to housing (Article 31), without forgetting the important impact of the non-discrimination clause (Article E) which obviously includes non-discrimination on grounds of poverty.

In its Conclusions 2020, the ECSR adopted a General Question on Article 15§3 as follows:

“The prevalence of poverty amongst people with disabilities in a State Party, whether defined or measured in either monetary or multidimensional terms, is an important indicator of the effectiveness of state efforts to ensure the right of people with disabilities to enjoy independence, social integration and participation in the life of the community. The obligation of states to take measures to promote persons with disabilities full social integration and participation in the life of the community is strongly linked to measures directed towards the amelioration and eradication of poverty amongst people with disabilities. Therefore, the Committee will take poverty levels experienced by persons with disabilities into account when considering the state’s obligations under Article 15§3 of the Charter. The Committee asks the next report to provide information on the rates of poverty amongst persons with disabilities as well as information on the measures adopted to reduce such poverty, including non-monetary measures.

Information should also be provided on measures focused on combatting discrimination against, and promoting equal opportunities for, people with disabilities from particularly vulnerable groups such as ethnic minorities, Roma, asylum-seekers and migrants. States should also make clear the extent to which the participation of people with disabilities is ensured in work directed towards combatting poverty amongst persons with disabilities.”

 

Recommendation CM/Rec(2015)3 of the Committee of Ministers to member States on the access of young people from disadvantaged neighbourhoods to social rights recommends measures to member States to prevent and eradicate the poverty, discrimination, violence and exclusion faced by young people. A human-rights based approach is the basis for the social and youth work interventions being implemented in co-operation with local authorities and youth organisations. The recommendation is available in English, French, Czech, Dutch, Georgian, Hungarian, German, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, Slovak, Spanish, Turkish and Ukrainian.

The member states’ governments having joined the Council of Europe Partial Agreement on Youth Mobility work together with the PA’s main partner, the European Youth Card Association (EYCA), to promote mobility solutions for young people. In 2023, a seminar explored ways in which the European Youth Card can promote access to social rights for all young people, including the most vulnerable groups.

The Steering Committee on Anti-discrimination, Diversity and Inclusion (CDADI) developed a new and comprehensive draft Committee of Ministers Recommendation on equality for Roma and Traveller women and girls, which was finalised in December 2023 and is to be presented to the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe for discussion and possible adoption in spring 2024. The guidelines encountered in the draft address several thematic areas including protecting Roma and Traveller women and girls from extreme poverty and ensuring their access to social protection.

The Committee of Experts on Roma and Traveller Issues (ADI-ROM Thematic Report ) on legislation and policies related to begging, with a special focus on children, analyses the socio-economic context as opposed to the socio-cultural. It focuses on the situation of children who occasionally or systematically resort to begging or are forced to beg, which is far more likely a consequence of their extreme poverty and marginalisation. The criminalisation and stigmatisation of Roma because of their culture is based on a false narrative that needs to be deconstructed and replaced by a more general, normalised and humane approach to combating extreme poverty. The approach advocated in this report is in line with the reasoning followed in 2021 by the European Court of Human Rights in the Lacatus v Switzerland judgment, where begging was considered as the applicant’s means of survival. The Court found the applicant in a clearly vulnerable situation, thereby having the right, inherent in human dignity, to be able to convey her plight and attempt to meet her basic needs by begging.

The ADI-ROM thematic report on How to stimulate governments to employ Roma and Travellers in governmental institutions and public administration, adopted in November 2022 contributes to reduce inequality in employment opportunities. The report examines existing national policies and laws, employment agencies and recruitment bodies policies, special measures and employment policies for Roma and presents good practices. It compares general employment data and Roma employment data, identifies gaps and offers solutions on how to fill them including targeted measures to enhance the recruitment of Roma outside of the regular recruiting processes.

The ROMACT and ROMACTED Programmes continuously promote inclusive democratic governance at local level while ensuring that the Roma people are integrated in the measures and services provided by the administrations.

 

With regard to ending poverty, the Parliamentary Assembly adopted Resolution 2197 (2018) on "The case for a basic citizenship income". The Assembly promoted further ratifications and effective implementation of the European Social Charter through Resolution 2180 (2017) and Recommendation 2112 (2017) on The “Turin process: reinforcing social rights in Europe". It also referred to this most comprehensive social rights standard in a recent text relating to poverty explicitly, namely Resolution 1995 (2014) on "Ending child poverty in Europe".  In 2021, the Assembly adopted a Resolution 2366 (2021) and a Recommendation 2196 (2021) on the “Impact of labour migration on “left-behind” children”. In May 2022  Resolution 2442 (2022) on “Eradicating extreme child poverty in Europe: an international obligation and a moral duty”  was also adopted.

 The Council of Europe Development Bank (CEB), in the framework of its unique social mandate, co-finances social investment projects in its member countries. The Bank’s activities are fully aligned with the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) agenda. The CEB is committed to sustainable social development and inclusion, and has prioritised the SDGs that are closest to its mandate and sectors of operation. In its capacity as a social development financier, the CEB-financed projects support the member States’ populations regarded as vulnerable, such as persons living below the poverty threshold (less than 60% of the national average income).[1]

The report of European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights, Combating child poverty: an issue of fundamental rights, underlines how combating child poverty is also a matter of realising their fundamental rights. It suggests that the EU and its Member States should tighten existing laws and policies to meet legal standards under the UN’s Child Rights Convention and the European Social Charter. This would enable them to tackle child poverty better.

The Report ‘Protecting the Child from Poverty: The Role of Rights in the Council of Europe’, which was presented at the International Conference on Children’s Rights on 13 November 2019, focuses on the role of children’s rights in addressing child poverty in the Council of Europe. Both, the 1961 European Social Charter and the Revised Charter of 1996 set out a wide range of rights with implications for state efforts to combat child poverty. These include Article 30 on the right to protection from poverty and social exclusion – the only provision under international human rights law that explicitly outlines a right to protection from poverty, but also other child poverty relevant provisions relating to the right to work, the right to protection of health, the right to social security, the right to social and medical assistance, the right to social, legal and economic protection of the family as well as of children and young persons, etc.

In a Declaration adopted on 11 December 2019, the Committee of Ministers expressed concern about the very high rates of child poverty in Europe and the growing inequalities that particularly affect them. The Committee of Ministers called on member states to: implement the Council of Europe Strategy for the Rights of the Child (2016-2021); review the objectives and funding of services such as child protection, education, social services and social protection programmes; improve child protection services, taking into account particularly vulnerable situations (e.g. children without parental care, single-parent families, children with disabilities, Roma children, and refugee and migrant children); to take into account the needs of children and encourage their participation in the development of child protection policies.

The Thematic report of the Committee of Experts on Roma and Traveller Issues (ADI-ROM) on legislation and policies related to begging, with special focus on children analyses the socio-economic context as opposed to the socio-cultural. It focuses on the situation of children who occasionally or systematically resort to begging or are forced to beg, which is far more likely a consequence of their extreme poverty and marginalisation. The criminalisation and stigmatisation of Roma because of their culture is based on a false narrative that needs to be deconstructed and replaced by a more general, normalised and humane approach to combating extreme poverty. The approach advocated in this report is in line with the reasoning followed in 2021 by the European Court of Human Rights in the Lacatus case, where it was considered that begging could represent a right inherent in human dignity.

The approach of the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities is based on three key principles: achieving SDGs is the shared responsibility of all levels of government; local and regional authorities must have the necessary competences and financial autonomy to achieve the goals in their respective areas; citizens must always remain at the heart of the action.

For the Congress, the poverty eradication is based on citizen responsibility. Through its local dimension, the Congress battles against poverty by promoting policies ensuring sustainable livelihoods and equality.

The Congress adopted the following texts in relation to SDG 1:

REC381 (2015) and RES391 (2015) - Fighting the increasing poverty of women: the responsibility of local and regional authorities

REC210 (2007) and RES229 (2007) - The evolution of extreme poverty in European towns

 

The work of the Commissioner for Human Rights concerning poverty focuses on addressing the deepening and long-term effects of austerity measures on human rights and ensuring that national and regional authorities uphold human rights protection, particularly of those groups of people disproportionately hit as a result of those measures. The activities of the Commissioner on this theme are developed under the thematic area ‘Economic crisis and human rights’. In the Issue Paper ‘Safeguarding human rights in times of economic crisis’ (2013), the Commissioner issued actionable recommendations which help forge a new path along which governments can align their economic recovery policies with their commitments for human rights.

 

See the Commissioner’s thematic webpage ‘Economic crisis and human rights’

See also Commissioner’s thematic webpage on social rights.

 

See in particular:

Human Rights Comments:

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[1] Poverty threshold: in European comparisons, this threshold is fixed at 60% of the equivalent average income in the country of residence.