The executive wants to facilitate the “validation of acquired experience” for family caregivers

Towards a better consideration of the work of caregivers. Faced with recruitment difficulties, the government wants to recognize the professional skills developed by family carers, the first step in a broader reform of the “validation of acquired experience” (VAE), a device that remains little known. The executive will slip an article to this effect in the next text devoted to the extension of the rules of unemployment insurance, presented on September 7 in the Council of Ministers.

The objective is to facilitate the recognition of the skills acquired by these people who support an elderly, sick, disabled person or in a situation of loss of autonomy. And for good reason, thehe old age sector is one of those where recruitment needs are massive.

“In the health sector, in industry or transport, where nurses, technicians and drivers are massively lacking”initial and continuous training “are unable to meet demand in the short term”, exposes the executive in its bill. The VAE is therefore a third way to explore.

Created in 2002, it makes it possible to obtain professional certification thanks to the recognition of one’s experience, whether the latter was acquired through salaried, self-employed or voluntary activities. The procedure has two stages: admissibility and, after several months of work to compile a thick file justifying the skills acquired over the years, the passage before a validation jury.

But its setting work stay shy because “the steps to access it remain complex and the support is not continuous”, according to a report submitted in 2021 by three experts to the government. In 2020, a year marked by the Covid-19 pandemic, 30,000 candidates appeared before a jury, a drop of 18% compared to 2019. Among them, just over 18,000 obtained full certification. The number of successful candidates is down 16% compared to 2019 and is at its lowest level since 2004.