Malmo
- City: Malmo
- Country: Sweden
- Population: 333 633
- Location: 55.605|13.0038
On 16 September 2020, Malmo signed a pledge to principle 11 of the European Pillar of Social Rights, reaffirming its commitment to childcare and support to children.
Malmo pledged to:
- Invest yearly over 281 million EUR from the municipal budget into preschools to ensure all children aged 3-5 have access to inclusive early childhood education and care
- Invest yearly over 1.6 million EUR into 9 open preschools to give extra support to children from migrant background
- Set up a new family centre, in addition to the 6 already existing, where all people, especially those with migrant background can freely access integrated services for childcare and preschool, health and social counselling, pedagogical support and language learning for children and parents, all under the same roof as a ‘one-stop-shop’.
- Build capacity of the family centres to respond to the increasing demand and needs from families seeking support for a better integration through language learning and mentoring support
Malmo’s Deputy Mayor for social affairs and integration, Sedat Arif, said: “‘A strong social Europe should start with children. Children should have good living standards and a natural place in our cities. Malmo is working to guarantee the right to childcare and support for all children”.
On 13 February 2019, Malmo became the 18th city to sign a pledge to the European Pillar of Social Rights. The Mayor of Malmo Katrin Stjernfeldt Jammeh signed a strong commitment to ensure equal opportunities (principle 3) and provide active support to employment (principle 4).
To achieve equal opportunities, Malmo is committed to deliver a strategic plan on non-discriminatory and equal access to municipal services. To this end, Malmo pledges to:
- Train all directors, managers and employers within the city administration about Swedish anti-discrimination laws to ensure the city of Malmo provides a discrimination-free workplace for its 25,500 employees.
- Invest over €1 million in 2017-2019 in the Roma knowledge and information centre to implement the local action plan for inclusion of Swedish Roma minority in all parts of society.
- Set up a ‘Malmo Council for the national Roma minority’ where politicians and Roma representatives meet regularly.
To provide active support to employment, Malmo is committed to:
- Increase the number of social welfare beneficiaries participating in job-seeking initiatives (already an increase of 43% from 2017 to 2018).
- Invest €2.88 million (30 million SEK) in 2019 to get 6,000 high school students into 1,140 summer internships (30% more than in 2018) offered by private and public employers in Malmo.
- Invest €22,2 million to offer Swedish language courses to 4,600 people with migrant background as a means to help them access the local labour market.
Malmo’s Mayor Katrin Stjernfeldt Jammeh said: “A stronger social Europe is a Europe of inclusive cities with inclusive labour markets. Malmo works actively to give citizens and residents equal access to the labour market and equal opportunities. Anyone who can work should be allowed and enabled to work”.