Family-work conciliation: people from Lombardy give their opinion

In Lombardy, Italy’s richest and most populous region, local government is promoting solutions that help mothers, fathers and carers improve the quality of their family lives without compromising their careers.

The online consultation over family-work conciliation was closed on January 31 with an outstanding number of participants: 1740, 78% of which are women.

It is an extraordinary participation rate for a public consultation on public policy considering that the usual consultations issued by the European Union receive on average between 200 and 500 replies.

The consultation helped to identify the targets of interest: families with children, families in a productive age, employees, entrepreneurs and self-employed workers.

Together with the drafting of a green paper, the online consultation is one of the initial steps to develop a path of co-planning and co-production of integrated policies promoting opportunities, answers and solutions in collaboration with a plurality of social actors such as the family.

Following the results of the public consultation and the revision of the green paper in view of the drafting of a white paper in depth seminars have been organized to further explore the issues and preparatory territorial agreements are being signed to facilitate conciliation at local level.