Friday 8th July 2022

 

On the 6th of July 2022, EASE held its General Assembly. The Assembly was chaired by Philippe Diallo, chairman of EASE, and gathered all the members of the association, even though two of them were online.

First of all, this Assembly was a great occasion to look back at the development of EASE over the past two years. Since 2020, EASE obtained 3 European projects, organised various EASE Talks and broadened its membership. It now represents 8 members and 7 countries among Europe and is in contact with many organizations in the sport ecosystem. The financial report and the business model have been formally accepted by the members, encouraging the dynamic of development of the association.

This was also a great time to present the current European projects. After the ESCSE project, granted in 2020 and started in January 2021, EASE launched in June and July 2022 two new projects: the BeST Inclusion project and the SDE Pro Sports project. The first one aims to contribute to the work for greater inclusion within the sport sector by making practical recommendations to sport employers regarding the employment of women, young people and people with disabilities. The final objective is to produce concrete recommendations applicable in each member state of the European Union, thanks to the identification of barriers to employment and the analysis of good practices among member states. On the other hand, the SDE Pro Sports project wants to develop social dialogue in professional sports in Europe. This project is based on mapping and highlighting the positive outcomes of social dialogue established in some member states, to help developing and strengthening a long-term social dialogue in professional sports, both at a European and national level.

From these projects, EASE is developing more and more actions and can now focus on the priority actions for its development. From the discussions with the members, it appeared that the next step for EASE development is the improvement of EASE representativeness, with the expansion of the association and the integration of new members. Therefore, in the coming months, EASE will focus on:

  • Leading European projects,
  • Identifying sport employers’ organisations in European countries,
  • Producing regular content for its members,
  • Carrying on the voice of sport employers in Europe thanks to lobbying and advocacy.

This will help the implementation of the association in the sports ecosystem and the improvement of its representativeness, while working with a global perspective on the sport sector and its economy.

In the long run, these actions will allow the association to work towards its main goal, which is the creation of a European Sectoral Social Dialogue Committee on sport, that would create a structured space of social dialogue in Europe for sport employers and employees.