1. Case-study No. & Title:
No. 235. Improving labour market opportunities for unemployed Roma, Region Most, North-Bohemia, Czech Republic

A program to increase chances on the labour-market for (mainly long-term) unemployed Roma, by creating so-called Public Useful Jobs in co-operation between the local authorities, the Labour Office and local Roma-organisations.

Keywords

w	Economic development
w	Human capacity building
w	Co-operation
w	Other, namely: employment

2. Author information
2.1 Author’s Name
Peter Mulder

2.2 Institutional Affiliation and Contact Details:
Peter Mulder (Chairman občanské sdružení Spolu-CZ)
Spolu-CZ
P.O. Box 651
661 51 Brno-2
The Czech Republic

Tel.: +420-603-843.982 (private)
Fax: +420-5-4524.61.66 (work)
E-mail: peter.mulder@post.cz

2.3 Date recorded
20/03/2001

3. Good Practice Information Sheet
3.1 Local Level Good Practice
The Labour Office in the north-Bohemian city Most has started a long-term program to increase the chances on the labour-market of long-term unemployed, mainly Roma, clients. This program consists of the following parts:

1)	The main part is the creation of so-called public-useful jobs, in co-operation with local Roma organisations. These jobs are meant for long-term unemployed people, registered at the Labour Office. The aim of these jobs is to make people (again) get used to a working-routine and to gain working-experience. This should increase their chances on the regular labour market.
2)	The second part of the project is the employment of several Roma as school-assistants at several primary schools in the region
3)	The third part of the project consists of several forms of re-qualification and/or preparing unemployed people and school-drop-outs to (re-)enter the labour-market.

3.2 Location:
The region of Most is known for its high unemployment and its relatively high percentage of Roma inhabitants. The project concerns the city Most (70,000 inhabitants) and several localities in the region of Most (the region of Most has approximately 130,000 inhabitants).

3.3 Minority/Target Groups:

Minority:	Roma
Target groups:	Long-term unemployed Roma, registered at the Labour Office, in the region of Most, North-Bohemia, The Czech Republic

3.4 Major Actors Involved

w	Local Government
w	Local NGO
w	Public institution
w	Minority organisations
w	Private institution or enterprise
w	Other, namely: police

3.5 Budget allocated by local government authorities and/or by other actors
The main part of the project concerns the creation of public-useful jobs. People employed in public useful jobs receive the minimum wage. The minimum wage in the Czech Republic is around 3,000 CZK (approximately 82 USD) a month. The cost involved in providing one job is 3,000 CZK, plus the costs for insurance, taxes etcetera. At the start of the project, these costs are paid for by the Labour Office. The aim of the project is, however, to decrease the financial contribution of the Labour Office, and to increase the financial contribution from the side of the employer (firm, or Roma organisation). In this way, "real" jobs will be created. At the beginning of 2001, 100 people were employed in abovementioned way within the framework of the project.

Other costs of the project are the costs for organising the re-qualification-courses - also paid for by the Labour Office.

Timeframe

w	The project started in 1998, with the creation of 20 jobs in co-operation with the Roma-NGO "Dživas" in Chánov. During 1999, the organisation Lačo Drom in the municipality of Bečov joined the project, with the creation of 23 jobs. In May 2000, the "Association of Roma of the city Most" joined the project (25 jobs), in September 2000 the "Roma Christian Association" in the municipality of Obrnice joined the project (24 jobs).
w	From 6/11 - 18/12/2000 a re-qualification-course took place
w	From September 2000 until July 2001 a support-program is running that is directed to youngsters who did not continue with secondary education after leaving the primary school

3.7 Local level good practice relation to national level ethnic policy
The project is based on two main lines of state-policy, directed at combatting unemployment:

w	The creation of so-called public useful jobs is strongly stimulated by the Ministry of Labour as a way of support for long-term unemployed people to re-enter the labour-market.
w	The Czech government is developing policy to more actively use unemployment-benefit money to support the re-entry of unemployed people to the regular labour-market.

4. Good Practice Description
The Labour Office in the north-Bohemian city Most has started a long-term program to increase the chances on the labour-market of long-term unemployed, mainly Roma, clients. This program consists of the following parts:

1) Creation of public-useful jobs in co-operation with local Roma-organisations
The main part is the creation of so-called public-useful jobs, in co-operation with local Roma-organisations. These jobs are meant for long-term unemployed people, registered at the Labour Office. The aim of these jobs is to make people (again) get used to a working-routine and to gain experience. This should increase their chances on the regular labour-market.

The Labour Office in Most supports within the framework of Public Useful Jobs 4 Roma organisations. This support is in the long term aimed at the creation of regular jobs. When creating public-useful jobs, the costs of these jobs are paid for by the Labour Office. However, the aim is to decrease the financial support coming from the Labour Office, and to increase the financial contribution of the employers (the Roma-organisations). The jobs, created in this way, should work as a place for long-term unemployed people to get used (again) to a working-regime and to gain experience. This should increase their chances of finding regular employment on the labour-market. At the moment, the following organisations are taking part in the project:

w	The organisation Dživas has now been supported by the Labour Office for three years. The organisation’s aim is to look for solutions to the problem of employing Roma, and does this by creating job-opportunities for Roma-inhabitants of the housing-estate Most-15 (Chánov). The job-opportunities are linked to the cleaning and maintenance of the housing-estate and the flats, and in this way the prevention of their further decline. Apart from the Labour Office and the organisation Dživas, the following institutions participate in this co-operation: The Districts Office in Most, the town-hall of Most, the City Police and the department of Communal Services of Most. The organisation Dživas created 20 jobs in the following professions: cleaner, assistant-cleaner, accountant and project-manager.
w	The organisation Lačo Drom has been established with the aim to support the creation of jobs for clients of the Labour Office, living in the municipality of Bečov, where the unemployment-rate is high, as well as the number of Roma inhabitants. The organisation co-operates with the Bečov town-hall. Lačo Drom has been supported for the second year and has created 23 jobs including cleaning, driving mini-tractors, work as pedagogic assistants, accountants and project-managers. One of the activities of this organisation is pre-school preparation of Roma-children, supported by the Pedagogical-Psychological advisory service in Most.
w	Another organisation employing Roma within the framework of this project is the Association of Roma of the City Most. In this case, partners are the City of Most, the City Police of Most, the Czech State Police and the private firm Bilbo a.s.. As in the earlier mentioned projects, jobs have been created by the Labour Office paying the costs for 25 people. These people are employed as cleaners, co-ordinator of the cleaning-works, project-manager/accountant and a social worker.
w	The Roma Christian Association Obrnice has been supported by the Labour Office since November 2000. 25 jobs have been created for assistant-security employees, cleaners, builders, accountants and project-managers. Partners of the Association are the town-hall of Obrnice and the Czech State Police.

2) The employment of Roma as school-assistants at several primary schools in the region
Within the same framework of public useful jobs, 8 Roma assistants have been employed in primary schools in the region of Most. The concept of Roma assistant was created in the mid-1990s in the Czech Republic. These people, mainly Roma themselves, are employed at primary schools and have the following tasks:

w	support teachers in classes with a high number of Roma pupils
w	support schools in the communication between the teachers, the parents and the pupils
w	being a positive role-model for both Roma and non-Roma pupils. The concept of Roma assistants has proved the be successful in the whole of the Czech Republic.

3) Re-qualification and/or preparing unemployed people and school-drop-outs to re-enter the labour-market
The third part of the project consists of several forms of re-qualification and/or preparing unemployed people and school-drop-outs to re-enter the labour-market. Two parts of this project are already working:

The project MOST
Apart from the name of the city, the Czech word most also means "bridge". The target-group for the project "MOST" are youngsters with only primary-school education or with unfinished secondary-school education. Although the project is not primarily aimed at Roma youngsters, 40% of the participants are Roma. The project started in September 2000, and takes 10 months. During these ten months, the group, participating in the project, meets regularly. The program, prepared for the groups, consists of (aspects of) re-qualification, discussion, counselling, etc. The first group will finish the project in July 2001.

Re-qualification to assistant-security worker
A re-qualification-course for 18+ youngsters, directed to working in the security-sector. This project runs in two varieties. One group of participants are Roma, already employed but who want to do re-qualification, the second group are unemployed Roma, registered at the Labour Office. These people are being prepared to work as assistants within the police-force, where they should improve the communication between Roma and the police. At the same time, this will lower the unemployment among Roma. At this moment, Roma who took part in this re-qualification course are working as assistants with the City Police, helping to lower the crime-rate in Obrnice, Bečov and Most

A third part of this project is being prepared during 2001, and concerns re-qualification courses for Roma in traditional Roma crafts and trades, which could help a certain number of unemployed Roma to find paid employment on the regular labour-market.