Europe's population reckoning: How can the EU avoid falling off a demographic cliff? • FRANCE 24

Added: 2026-05-31

[00:00:12]Hello, this is Talking Europe. It's been called Europe's demographic time bomb.

[00:00:17]Older people are living longer while younger people are having fewer children. In France, for example, deaths outpaced births last year for the first time since the end of World War II prompting President Macron to call for demographic rearmament. Well, according to Eurostat, the European population is expected to shrink by 11.7% or 53 million people by the end of this century. The key thing here is the fertility rate which has dropped to around 1.3 births per woman. That's below replacement level.

[00:00:54]It's obviously a complicated and touchy topic which we're going to try to unpack with our two guests. Lina Gálvez is a Spanish MEP from the Socialists and Democrats and chair of FEMM, the Committee on Women's Rights and Gender Equality. Welcome to the program again, Lina.

[00:01:09]>> Thank you for inviting me.

[00:01:10]>> And I'm also here with Romana Tomc, a Slovenian MEP from the European People's Party and she is co-chair of the Intergroup on Demography here at the EU Parliament. So, welcome to you as well.

[00:01:23]>> Thank you for the invitation.

[00:01:25]>> Romana Tomc, what is the main solution, let's say, that you're you're proposing when it comes to this fertility declining fertility?

[00:01:31]>> This is a million-dollar question.

[00:01:34]Nobody has a solution. If you would have a solution, then it would be easy. I think that young couples, young people are now most worried about their future when it comes to housing, for example, when it comes to certainty of employment. And uh probably they see our future maybe more pessimistic. They want to be sure that they can afford at the same time their career and children. And what we are promoting is that we must adopt a very clever politics where young people can have family life as well as their careers. This is not one or another. It should be both. We have to we have to make the society more, I would say, positive towards family life.

[00:02:35]This is nothing bad having more children.

[00:02:39]Although in the in the past, I would say that some they looked very strange to big families as not allowing women to have a career. This is what we would like to change. The the the thinking of society and the raising the awareness that without families, without children, it's no use doing politics here in the European Parliament because we are doing this politics for the people.

[00:03:08]>> So, to be clear, you you'd want to change the mentality so people want to have more children, basically.

[00:03:14]>> I don't want >> they wouldn't be sort of feel strange about wanting to have more children.

[00:03:20]>> Look, it's about culture. It's about mentality. But we cannot press on the button here in the European Parliament and change the mentality. This is a process and we have many tools to do so. But there is another I would say challenge for that because the family policy and many other politic policies are in the hands of the countries. And we are now sitting here in Strasbourg as well as we are sitting in Brussels, and we are imposing politics from somewhere above to the to the countries. The the principle of subsidiarity has to be respected fully, but we can help on the European level.

[00:04:08]>> Um Lena, I'd like to get back to this the sort of attitudes and cultural aspect of things that your colleague was talking about. I mean, of course there are economic pressures which are driving this demographic decline. There's also we we have to say the fact that um women are having children later, and when they have lower fertility, that may mean that they have fewer children than they actually wanted to have if they're leaving it till their late 30s. That's something that maybe should be talked about more openly as well.

[00:04:38]>> I mean, we we talk very openly about what is called the fertility gap, which is the number of children you ideally want to have and the ones you are really uh having. But obviously, in order to to have babies, we need some um circumstances in order to to decide that we are going to have it. And uh one thing is equality, because one thing we can't ask is the the responsibility of not having children is just a female responsibility. This is not true. So, when we are talking about uh better services, better employment, better access to housing, better access to social services, and so on, and parental leaves should be equal always, because otherwise it will be only us to take leaves, to to to take care, because there is a a huge imbalance yet now in Europe um among the time women spend with children and time men spend with children. There is a The European Times news survey that shows that very clearly.

[00:05:43]>> Yeah, it's >> So, we need more equality, no less equality, and we need uh economic policies that really provides with good employment, good social uh services, and good access to housing.

[00:05:57]>> Uh one thing we also need to mention, of course, is if Europe fails to solve this problem, if this ticking time bomb actually explodes, uh Romana Tomc, we're going to have a massive problem with uh the welfare with funding the welfare state pensions >> Yes, this is the situation that many of the countries are facing right now, including my country, where we have uh as in France, I would say pay-as-you-go system, so that means that those who are employed are paying pensions for those who are retired. And this system was built when the ratio was 1:7 in favor of those employed. It will be soon the situation uh just opposite. So, this is not sustainable, uh and uh well looking uh not into the problem, but away from the problem is the worst thing we can do now. We have to to be honest to ourselves that this is a a problem, that this is a big challenge, and that we have to do something about that.

[00:07:07]>> You you you you think >> I I I may agree with uh there is a a big challenges, and uh obviously we need a demographic balance, but pensions uh of the the are not only connected with demography, they are also connected with the uh percentage of people that it is on the labor market, and also with good wages, because it is deducted from our wages. So, if you have a very very low wages, a very precarious uh labor force, labor market, obviously you will not pay the pensions. But if you have a a very progressive and very uh uh strong labor market. You will be able to pay the pensions. And also is migration.

[00:07:49]And it is also the European Commission.

[00:07:51]It is not only the the case of a Spain showing that you can have also sustainable welfare state even pensions when migration it is coming. This is something because the total growth of population it is not only due to fertility rate, it's also due to to to migration. And the problem we have is true that we have also immigration changes within the European Union and that could bring to a zero sum some outcome.

[00:08:23]And there are some countries that are suffering more than others of this internal migration processes. But it's something that we really need to have in mind as well and that will also help us to sustain. I'm not saying this is one thing or another. I'm not saying that.

[00:08:38]Don't take that from me. But they are the two things that we have really to look at. And the best way to increase the fertility rate is through gender equality and through a good economic and social policy that it is guaranteeing good jobs, access to social services and access to housing.

[00:08:58]>> Yes, absolutely. This is something what I mentioned in the very beginning. The housing is a big problem. Of course, we would like to have as the best balance between the responsibilities when it comes to the child care between men and women. But the fact is that only women can can give birth to the child. And >> Only that. Only that. One one is the >> something where can be women very proud of that fact. And of course, we are living in a society when it comes to my country, for example, there is a complete share of the burden between men and women.

[00:09:43]>> Just look to the to the statistics.

[00:09:45]>> There is no There is no problem about that. We have in Slovenia the best parental leave law, I would say, the 1 year of paid leave.

[00:09:57]Uh and >> But it is transferable.

[00:09:59]>> It is trans >> Then then it is not equal.

[00:10:02]When When it is transferable >> normally it is transferred to the mother.

[00:10:07]>> about that, but I think that this is no problem for young people right now. No problem. This equality between men and women, I think that we reached a quite high level.

[00:10:20]Their problem is uncertainty when it comes to jobs, low-paid jobs also at the beginning. And first first top first is housing problem. When we can solve these problems, I think that we have all the other politics settled for more children in our society.

[00:10:43]>> Frankly, if you don't have equality on care, you will not enter in an equal position into the labor market. I mean, it's like a sack pack. We are not running with the same shoes and we we are having a sack pack that is heavier.

[00:10:57]So, that means we are not participating equally in the labor market. So, we will we will not find these very good jobs and and that really have an impact on decision on having babies. And regarding to housing, this is also This is um affecting the whole Europe, but in a very different way. In in some very touristic countries, like in Spain, the pressure in in the housing sector is is is very big with a lot of houses being taken from normal houses to tourist houses. And this is also affecting very much tomorrow. So we need regulation, much more regulation on that.

[00:11:37]>> Okay, well Just to add, of course, I can agree. I I said that the housing is a problem, but it's also a national competence depending from the government how much effort the governments put into solving this problem. I think that in some countries they are better, in some countries they are worse, but um well, let's say >> can do as much as we can from Europe.

[00:12:02]>> from the European perspective, we can also help to solve the problem on a general level.

[00:12:08]>> Of course demographics linked to many other things including housing, but that's and migration of course, which is a whole other debate that we could have, but we're going to have to leave it for this particular show. So thank you so much to both of my guests Lina Gálvez and Romana Tomc.

[00:12:23]That's all for this edition of Talking Europe.