euro 2.4 million European-Union fund to pay for retraining redundant miners

The government is planning to spend euro 2.4 million from the European Union (EU) PHARE fund on re-training 3,000 laid-off miners. In the last two-and-a-half years about 70,000 miners have left mining: 2,000 of them underwent re-training and half of them found work in other sectors. Economy Minister Janusz Steinhoff said, "Reducing output in the mining sector should be done as fast as possible." Deputy Economy Minister Andrzej Karbownik says mining debt has reached zl. 20.823 billion. In the last 5 months, coal mines only generated revenue of zl. 80 million, whereas losses for the whole sector were zl. 260 million. Although the EU has already allocated euro 61 million to subsidize companies hiring redundant miners, there is a danger some of the money (zl. 10.5 million) allocated for social welfare spending will not be utilized. It seems claiming social benefits is not very popular among unemployed miners and the government is considering moving the money to other forms of state support. So far, zl. 450,000 has been spent on re-training, but euro 2.4 million is still at the ministry's disposal. (Rzeczpospolita, page B2) J.K.