Over 90 million people and almost 20 million children are at risk of poverty or social exclusion in the European Union, a UN expert warned Tuesday. An estimated 700,000 people in the EU sleep on the streets each night and 30.1 percent of people with disabilities are at risk of poverty or social exclusion , the UN Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, Olivier De Schutter, said in a report published today.
“These are unacceptable numbers,” he declared. “The challenge now is to ensure that measures taken to alleviate poverty in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic are not superseded by blind economic policies that privilege unhelpful competition in social and tax matters,” he said. The report has been published ahead of the EU Social Summit to take place in Porto, Portugal on 7 May. Portugal holds the current EU Presidency.
“The devastating impact of COVID-19 serves as a stark reminder that the European Union must put human lives over economic policies,” stressed the UN expert. He urged the EU to use “the COVID-19 crisis as an opportunity to rethink its fundamental economic rules.” “20.5 million workers remain in poverty despite being employed, because of the growth of non-standard forms of employment and because wages are too low.
The EU must address this harmful competition as part of its efforts to fight poverty and protect social rights,” said the UN report. He will present the report to the 47th session of the UN Human Rights Council on 29 June.
Source- KUNA
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