The Conference on the Future of Europe will start - at last. This is a great victory for our Renew Europe group, who initiated it.
Dacian Cioloş, President of Renew Europe Group: « The Conference is a unique exercise in continental participative democracy. All of Europe’s problems will be put on the table. All solutions will be envisaged. It’ll be a Conference with the citizens and without taboos ».
This unprecedented democratic exercise will give European citizens a direct say on the Europe they want. All subjects will be up for debate, including the strengthening of democratic decision-making processes at European level. It is a matter of opening doors and windows, of giving citizens their rightful place in the construction of the European project.
The Conference’s debates can be organised in many different ways, at national, local, regional and also at European level. Citizens' agora’s will be created, they will have to reflect European diversity.
European citizens will also have the opportunity to express themselves through an interactive and multilingual digital platform.
We also want to involve national parliaments, civil society, associations and all representative European institutions in this great democratic debate.
The first conclusions of this great debate will be drawn in one year's time, in the spring of 2022. They should take the form of concrete proposals for the future of Europe.
Renew Europe will take its rightful place in this debate. We are already preparing citizens' panels, whose contributions will feed into the work of the Conference on the Future of Europe.
The European Parliament, as the only institution directly elected by citizens, will play a leading role in the organisation of the Conference. The political groups involved in this initiative will ensure this. Alongside the Joint Declaration, the Conference of Presidents adopted a text recalling the leading role that the Parliament will have in the Conference. This role “will be reflected in the work and in the practical organisation of the Conference itself”
"The Conference on the Future of Europe is a priority for our Renew Europe Group. We have fought hard for it. So today it is a great cause for satisfaction. Europeans will be able to speak up and say what kind of Europe they want. We invite them all to take an active part in this unprecedented democratic exercise. We wanted this great debate, we have obtained it and we will make sure that the voice of the citizens is heard", Dacian Cioloş added.
For more information, please contact
Hughes Beaudouin
Mob : +32 473 400 129