Active labour policies and training - Guaranteed employability of workers (GOL)

The GOL (Guaranteed Employability of Workers) programme is a reform action introduced by Italy's National Plan for Recovery and Resilience (PNRR) to boost employment in Italy and combat unemployment: it provides a range of services for the re-employment of unemployed, laid-off workers, the disabled, women, young people, the over-55s and other disadvantaged groups.

According to estimates by the National Agency for Active Employment Policies (ANPAL), the programme will involve a total of 3 million beneficiaries until 2025.

The implementation of the programme is based on cooperation between the public and private system of employment and training services and on the integration of social welfare and employment services on the territory. The programme is based on an articulated training offer that succeeds in intercepting the needs of companies through the construction of a shared catalogue and the availability of the service offer in a capillary manner throughout the entire provincial territory, also with the development of online services.

Its interventions are part of the broader project of reforms in the labour sector, the implementation of which is connected to the Plan for the strengthening of employment centres (CPI) and the National New Skills Plan, for the strengthening of the dual system (training moments 'in the classroom' and practical training moments in 'work contexts').

The Budget Law 2024 linked the programme to measures such as the Training and Work Support (active from 1 September 2023) and the Inclusion Allowance, which from 2024 will take the place of the Citizenship Income.

To access the GOL programme, it is necessary to apply to the Job Centres (CPI) in the area of competence, which may envisage forms of cooperation between the public and private systems.

During the assessment (evaluation) process, actions must be identified that the project defines in 5 specific paths:

1. Reinsertion into employment: this is a pathway for those who are closest to the labour market, useful for directing users to immediate reintegration into the market, through accompanying actions to work, also through accredited subjects;
2. Upskilling - updating: this is a pathway that makes use of short training tools that may be aimed at the acquisition of basic skills (IT, language or entrepreneurship), professionalising skills, to integrate missing skills with reference to the professional figure sought
3. Reskilling - retraining: this is a pathway which makes use of more structured training tools with the aim of developing in the beneficiary professional skills and knowledge different (in terms of sector, processes and/or reference fields) from those mastered at the beginning of the training, and/or professional skills and knowledge leading to an increase, compared to the starting situation, of qualification levels;
4. Work and inclusion: this is a pathway dedicated to fragile people, for whom re-employment is difficult, also due to profiles of reconciliation difficulties or social problems, in relation to which the synergy with the territorial network of social services is useful to assess the profile from a multidimensional point of view and outline the most suitable tools;
5. Collective outplacement: these are paths for workers belonging to the same company, in crisis, and which must therefore be assessed not only as an individual need, but as a collective intervention.

At its meeting of 5 March 2022, the Provincial Council adopted the preliminary Provincial Plan for the implementation of the GOL programme, to be submitted for final approval to the National Agency for Active Employment Policies (ANPAL).

After the go-ahead from ANPAL, with Resolution No. 1295 of 15 July 2022, the Provincial Council definitively approved the Provincial Implementation Plan of the Programme. This approval allowed the start-up of the activities envisaged through the relevant GOL public Notices.

Below are the amendments and updates to the Provincial Implementation Plan of the GOL Programme:

- Provincial Council Resolution No. 2077 of 20 October 2023 (following the positive opinion from ANPAL for the examination of the proposed amendment to the Regional Implementation Plan 2022);

-Deliberation of theProvincial Council no. 2314 of 15 December 2023;

-Deliberation ofthe Provincial Council no. 473 of 12 April 2024 (following the relative positive opinion by ANPAL regarding the assessment of the consistency of the updated financial framework with the resources pertaining to the year 2023 with respect to the National GOL Programme).

-Deliberation ofthe Provincial Council no. 1194 of 2 August 2024 (subsequent to the positive opinion of the Ministry of Labour and Social Policies concerning the 2023 update of the regional implementation plan)

- Positive opinion of the Ministry of Labour concerning the consistency assessment of the updated financial framework in relation to the sums allocated for the 2024-2025 annuities of the National GOL Programme.

The GOL programme confirms the current approach of the implementation modality of the offer of active policy services, which is based on a dual track

1. the issuing of open Notices/Tenders that envisage an evaluation of the training projects submitted aimed at the approval of a ranking of training proposals with a strong supervision of the PA in their management and implementation;
2. the use of vouchers issued to users for the use of active labour policy services at an accredited body chosen by the users themselves.

At the same time, a strong tutoring action of the public operator is maintained over the entire pathway.

For further details, please refer to the following web pages:

1. Notice 1: PaT service sheet and Agenzia del Lavoro information sheet
2. Notice 2: PaT service fact sheet and Agenzia del Lavoro news
3. Notice 3: PaT service fact sheet and Agenzia del Lavoro information sheet

Promoting the employability of workers in transition and of unemployed and unemployable persons, with a focus on those considered vulnerable and most distant from the labour market.

Contributing to the target by 2025:

• reaching at least 29,400 subjects, at least 75% of whom must be women, long-term unemployed, people with disabilities, young people under 30, workers over 55
• at least 7,840 of the above-mentioned subjects must be involved in training actions, of which 2,940 must be for the strengthening of digital skills
• at least 80 per cent of job centres in the territory meet the standards defined as essential levels in GOL.

The Province as the implementing party makes use of the Employment Agency.

Source NRP

The actual allocations are defined annually by ministerial decrees that take as a reference the number of beneficiaries taken on and the state of progress of expenditure.

As of November 2023, the allocations are as follows:

• Annuality 2022: € 8,624,000
• Annuality 2023: € 8,760,000

Furthermore, in order to favour the planning of interventions on a multi-year basis:

• First tranche annuality 2024: € 4,380,000
• First instalment annuality 2025: € 4,380,000

The Provincial Implementation Plan for theyear 2022 has an overall budget of €12,232,770, taking into account the additional provincial resources already assigned to the Employment Agency for a total of €3,608,770.00.

Theupdate of the Implementation Plan foresees a budget of 9,360,000 euro for 2023, of which 8,760,000 covered with PNRR resources and 600,000 with resources available on the Agenzia del Lavoro budget.

She objectives set for 2022 have been achieved.adoption of the Implementation Plan and the profiling and treatment of 5,004 subjects (equal to 17.02% of the total beneficiaries of the Programme).

By 31.12.2023, 12,813 users had been taken on, of whom 7928 in 2023, reaching the target set for 2023 (7,300):

1. Re-employment: 8,014 (62.5%)
2. Retraining (upskilling): 3250 (25.4%)
3. Retraining (reskilling): 648 (5.1%)
4. Work and inclusion: 901 (7.0%)

The training target was also reached in 2023 (1374, of which 977 in e-skills, compared to the target of 1,350).