NRC

Lívia Járóka

What is your name and current position?

Lívia Járóka, Member of the European Parliament from Hungary.

What is your political belonging as a member of the European Parliament?

I am a member of FIDESZ (Hungarian Civic Union) and the Group of the European People’s Party and European Democrats and I serve on the Committee on Women’s Rights and Gender Equality as the deputy coordinator for European People’s Party and European Democrats group, the Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice, and Home Affairs and the Committee on Culture and Education .

Please describe your previous activities before becoming an MEP (short biography).

After getting MA in sociology from the Central European University Warsaw campus I made an MA in philosophy at Social Anthropology at University College London. Once, finishing my MA in philosophy I continued my studies at the same university, and started my doctorate study titled “The Politics of Ethnic Identity among Roma in Hungary”. I have been actively participated in Hungarian and international Roma civil rights movement for 10 years.

What is your opinion about the current Roma situation in Europe?

A huge number of Roma faces severe discrimination and exclusion in educational systems throughout Europe. The Roma also face important obstacles in obtaining employment. Often, this is related to their inability to receive an sufficient education, particularly as Europe becomes an increasingly knowledge-based economy.Iinefficient education, ghetto housing and chronic unemployment, are self-evidently interlinked, causing a vicious circles.

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For the parents who will not enroll their children in school, besides the fines so far terminating of social assistance is being predicted if they are beneficiaries.

The socially endangered families will remain without the monetary assistance from the state if the parents do not enroll their children in elementary education. The social assistance will also be terminated for the parents who will not enroll their children in high school if it becomes obligatory in the next year. This is the measure for stimulation for total seizure of the children in education which will be applied in the following school year. The stimulative measure is predicted to be implemented in the new law for social protection, which will be prepared by the Ministry of labor and social policy, and also at the moment the Ministry of education is working on measures for seizure of as many children as possible in education. According to the statistical data, social assistance is being used by total of 65 960 households.

The socially endangered families which receive assistance from the state will continue to receive it if they enroll their children in school. The medical certificate for the child which says that has received all of the necessary vaccines will be evidence that the child is included in education. Only in this way the socially endangered families can continue to receive social assistance – says Zaklina Velickovska, a spokesperson for the Ministry of labor and social policy.

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