We are building a Policy Lab which seeks to identify, develop, and test possible policy changes that would help families. This work builds impact by design in the project by road-testing the evidence identified in the stocktaking pillar of our research. Expected outputs involve review of relevant policies, a set of recommendations for policy reforms, and a roadmap for implementation.
To make this happen, we have recruited two stakeholder panels: one of family representatives from the national level and another of European policy experts. Our panellists bring a wide range of expertise and insights from across civil society, policymaking, social partners, and research. rEUsilience researchers will boost this process by evaluating the feasibility of selected reforms.
Both our stakeholder panels met for the first time on the 25th March 2024 for a kick off session. Then in June the panels met in Brussels to exchange knowledge and formulate policy proposals. Next stop for the Policy Lab was the meeting in January 2025 in Brussels to assess policy proposals based on the research and feasibility assessments carried out by the researchers since the previous meeting.
The last Policy Lab took place on the 26th of June 2025 in Brussels, the day before the Final Conference. This concluding session brought both stakeholder panels, representatives from national family organisations and European policy experts, together. Building upon the prior three Policy Lab sessions, a roadmap with implementation pathways for family resilience based on the policy solutions developed in the lab was presented. During this session, the draft roadmap was presented, and its potential was discussed with stakeholders. In addition, insights were shared by the researchers from the national impact events in Croatia, Sweden, Poland, UK, Spain, and Belgium.
To read the full Final Policy Lab and Conference Report, click here.