In English
Municipalities will take over TE offices’ tasks
From the beginning of 2025, the municipalities will take care of employment and economic development services. Up until now this has been the responsibility of TE offices, run by the state.
There will be 45 employment areas which will, for the large part, serve several municipalities. Only the local authorities of Lahti, Kouvola, Helsinki and Vantaa will organise this service themselves.
From the point of view of public administration, this is a major change. For the unemployed job-seeker, the reform should not bring any change to vital services.
However, the once familiar TE offices are set to disappear. Those seeking work must check the new contact information regarding employment services. This should be on your municipality’s web page. If you have an existing contact person at the TE office you can expect a change in who is dealing with your case.
Those seeking work must check the new contact information regarding employment services.
The basic idea of this administrative reform is to produce employment services that are better suited to people in a particular locality. As the municipalities know their own area, companies and situation, they should be able to respond faster and address the local need for employees.
The municipalities have been pursuing reform of this nature for a long time. They already pay a part of unemployment costs but have been unable to influence the employment services.
One of the problems in dealing with unemployment has been the silo-like structures, says Erja Lindberg, Development Manager at the Association of Finnish Cities and Municipalities, in her interview for this magazine. There is a lot of competence and actors, but no one takes care of the whole. For this reason, people have been falling in between services.
– In the municipalities, this is like assembling a jigsaw puzzle to get the appropriate services in each case. For this reason, there is no one right model that would fit everywhere. Actors, jobs, and the unemployed vary in every area. Local strengths and developments must be taken into account, she adds.
Financial carrot for municipalities
The state will provide more money to the municipalities for their new employment undertakings. The amount of support will be calculated on the basis of the number of working-age people and unemployed in the municipality in question.
However, the amount to be paid for integration training will be based on the number of people with mother tongues other than the national languages.
As the payment of unemployment benefits is to be transferred to the municipalities, the latter will receive compensation from the state.
As a carrot, state support will not be earmarked. It may be used for costs other than employment services, also. Once municipalities succeed in making a real reduction in unemployment, they will be free to use surplus money for other costs.
Also, the longer a person remains unemployed the bigger the share of the benefit burden on the municipality. This should spur on municipalities to invest in employment services. It would both reduce unemployment and lower the benefit costs a municipality has to pay out.
Of course, there is a danger that municipalities will channel part of the new employment service money elsewhere. The ministry of employment will follow developments, but municipalities get to decide.
