With many of the priority policy areas for the EU now being further highlighted by the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic<\/a>, Europe\u2019s institutions need to act to ensure both Europe\u2019s sustainable future and, moreover, to ensure that the voice of the Union\u2019s citizens are heard.<\/p>\n
Involving European citizens and consumers in achieving the UN\u2019s SDGs is an important issue. There are three main objectives to the Next Generation EU programme:<\/p>\n
It is important for European institutions to be involved in such a dialogue because the \u2018New Deal for Consumers\u2019 initiative and the European Green Deal must be linked. The role of the European institutions will be extremely important in achieving the future transition, and this is particularly true of the European Parliament. The European Parliament is the only one of the three main institutions (the European Commission, the European Council, and the European Parliament) that effectively represents all of Europe\u2019s citizens. The Council represents the European governments, and the Commission is the political arm of the EU; the European Parliament represents citizens because we are elected by them.<\/p>\n
In all of our political documents, reports, resolutions and so on, we try to ensure that citizens are involved, and we also work to provide outreach materials to ensure that the right information reaches EU citizens. This is important because the change that we need to see will start both bottom-up (from citizens) and top-down (from the European institutions).<\/p>\n
As an elected member of the European Parliament, I believe that it is important to engage and support initiatives such as the \u2018SDGs for Well-Being and Consumers\u2019 Protection\u2019, as well as to attend and take part in conferences, webinars, and many other kinds of action in order to help facilitate this.<\/p>\n
The Conference on the Future of Europe represents an important point in the process towards the transition. It is not too much to say that we are running out of time to ensure that the future of the European Union is the right one.<\/p>\n
When we look back to the last financial crisis, which we experienced in 2008, it is clear that the European Union did not respond as well as its citizens expected (or deserved). Now, there are several worrying movements in Europe \u2013 populism, extremism, and anti-Europe sentiments. For instance, the latter of which has resulted in the United Kingdom leaving the EU. We were therefore in a very critical time even before the COVID-19 pandemic began. Now, as we begin to see hopeful signs that we may be beating the coronavirus, we had to decide whether we wanted to strengthen the EU or dissolve it and, fortunately, we decided to strengthen the bloc \u2013 both at the political level but also by empowering our citizens and responding to them in a more effective way.<\/p>\n
In the current climate, the European Union has, I believe, responded well to the challenges that have arisen as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, which has provided us with an opportunity to rethink how the EU can evolve into a more cohesive union moving forwards.<\/p>\n
The Conference on the Future of Europe should therefore be seen as a starting point on the foundations of which we are able to rebuild our institutional architecture. We have now realised that the EU is something that offers value and is certainly worth saving, and so now is the time to act to ensure that this is achieved. We must understand, and perhaps COVID-19 is teaching us that lesson, that some challenges are only surmountable if we work together.<\/p>\n
Yes, I believe that this inter-institutional group is a great initiative because there is no doubt that we all have to work together to achieve our objectives. Of course, the protection of consumer rights will continue to be a main objective, but we must also see a paradigm shift in terms of consumer attitudes, and that will only become effective if all stakeholders co-operate. This initiative is a very important example of that.<\/p>\n
In Spain, we have an Active Citizenship Network that works with the national institutions. That has been functioning well over the past few years and is perhaps a model that can be built on and expanded so that it works for the whole of the EU, bringing citizens together with the Commission, Council and Parliament.<\/p>\n
While I am not in all of the Parliamentary Committees that are active in these areas, it is clear that the European Parliament has been working for some time to ensure that consumer rights are protected (as evinced in the numerous Directives, which have been approved by the European Parliament and Council and implemented by the European Commission), on the one hand, while on the other hand, we are also trying to develop as many Resolutions and Directives as possible to help change consumption habits.<\/p>\n
For example, a few months ago we adopted a Resolution to try to reduce the number of different chargers required for electronic devices in the EU \u2013 currently, you may need one for your mobile phone, and another different one for a camera, and another still for a tablet, and so on. This is just one example of the way in which the European Parliament is working, but there are also many others. The European Parliament is the main institution involved in this Resolution and indeed, it is the Parliament that always goes further down such routes than either the Commission or the Council. To take European climate law as an example: the European Commission wanted emissions to be reduced to 40% of pre-industrial levels by 2030, but the Parliament wanted to increase this reduction to 60%. Finally, through the trilogues between the European Commission, Council, and Parliament, we were able to agree on a reduction of 55%, but that target would not have been reached if the Parliament had not originally put forward an even higher figure.<\/p>\n
The European Parliament is thus the best institution to try to promote the changes that we need in terms of consumer behaviour, and we will hopefully continue to be as effective as we have been elsewhere.<\/p>\n
Marcos Ros Sempere<\/strong>
\nMember of European Parliament<\/strong>
\nmarcos.ros@europarl.europa.eu <\/strong>
\nTweet @mrossemp<\/strong>
\nwww.europarl.europa.eu\/meps\/en\/204413\/MARCOS_ROS+SEMPERE\/home<\/strong><\/p>\n
Please note, this article will also appear in the fifth edition of our\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>quarterly publication<\/em><\/strong><\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"