National and European representatives from the social and the banking sectors and of public authorities came together in Brussels on 18th October to exchange views on the role of the European Union in unlocking the much needed investment into local innovative social infrastructure projects. The objective of the event, entitled Social Infrastructure Investment, from local innovative ideas to InvestEU project funding, co-organized by AGE Platform Europe together with organisations representing major stakeholders in the social, health, education and housing sectors, was to identify solutions to the current investment gap in social infrastructure – of an estimated €150 billion per year for the next ten 
To that end, four steps were highlighted by the conference organisers as necessary to make InvestEU a success for social infrastructure investment, focusing on :
- Sectoral involvement: ensure a formal involvement of the social sectors to identify local projects and build up effective instruments for social infrastructure investment;
- Capacity building for all: building up the capacity of stakeholders (authorities, investors and service providers) at all levels to translate ideas for better services into viable and bankable projects for investors;
- Quality: a focus on quality and innovative projects will be crucial to show EU’s added value for people across Europe. This should be a priority of the Investment Guidelines.
- Making full use of the available fiscal flexibity, referred to in the Investment Clause of the EU fiscal rules.
You can read more in this short report by the European Association of Service providers for Persons with Disabilities (EASPD).
You can also read here the joint letter that we sent in September to the European Commission In view of influencing the objectives of post 2020 EU investments and the InvestEU proposal.
For more information, please contact contact Maciej Kucharczyk, maciej.kucharczyk@age-platform.eu
