The two Presidency Trios to draw up a balance and look to the future - Main contents

Minister of State of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Eniko Gyori has invited the Ministers of State for EU Affairs of the current and the next Presidency Trios to Budapest, on 1 June 2011. Together with her Spanish, Belgian, Polish, Danish and Cypriot partners, Ms Gyori will prepare the takeover procedure between the two Trio Presidencies.

The purpose of the meeting is to jointly assess the state of play in the most important dossiers, and also to enumerate issues where the current Trio Presidency could support its successor and to identify heritage of the Spanish-Belgian-Hungarian Trio; i.e. closed and remaining open matters. It is an important element of the meeting that the current Trio will share its most important 'lessons learned', with the Polish-Danish-Cypriot Trio, and raise awareness of particular areas, which require special care, such as relations with the European Parliament (EP).

Following the trail of the Trio partners, the Hungarian Presidency has declared and proven in practice several times, that it would be a Parliament-friendly Presidency. In the working dinner of 1 June, special attention will once again be directed to the issue of how cooperation between the Council and EP could be improved, in the new institutional framework established after the implementation of the Treaty of Lisbon; and what options exist for the resolution of the disputed issues.

Ms Gyori will update the EU Ministers of the current and the future Trio Presidency, on the accomplishments of the Hungarian Presidency concerning the most important legislative and non-legislative matters; as well as on what level of completion they will be transferred to the Polish Presidency, at the end of June. Among others issues, they will review the following dossiers: European Economic Governance, The Single Market, The Unitary Patent, Financial Services and Taxation Matters, The Small Business Act Review, Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs), The Eurovignette, The White Paper on Transport, The Decarbonisation Roadmap, Nuclear 'Stress Tests', Radioactive Waste Management, The Role of Water in EU Development Policy, Danube Strategy, Schengen Reform, Migration and Asylum, Croatian Accession.

At the invitation of Deputy Secretary of State for EU Affairs, Bálint Ódor, the European Directors of the present Spanish-Belgian-Hungarian and the upcoming Polish-Danish-Cypriot Presidency Trios, met on 30 May 2011 in Budapest, in order to prepare for the working dinner.

Composed of Spain, Belgium and Hungary, the Presidency Trio started its work on 1 January 2010, on the first day of the Spanish Presidency. At the same time, this cooperation, which serves long term planning was launched much earlier: Secretaries of State for European Affairs of the Spanish-Belgian-Hungarian Trio have held regular meetings since 2008, and have prepared a Trio programme in 2009.

The Secretaries of State representing the Spanish-Belgian-Hungarian Trio, have continued their close cooperation during the term of the Hungarian Presidency as well, which established a precedent to be followed in the Union.

A case in point is that at the end of the meeting of Ministers for Demography and Family Policy Issues, held in Gödöllo on 1 April the Trio Presidency (Spain, Belgium, Hungary) and Poland signed a joint statement on the compatibility of work and family life and its effect on the development of the population.

It was another outstanding joint success of the Spanish-Belgian-Hungarian Presidency Trio that in their meeting of 19 May 2011 held in Brussels, the EU Ministers for Culture, reached a political agreement on elevating the title of European Cultural Heritage to the Union level.

The joint Presidency logo showing the tricolours of the three countries in a uniform design and the numerous cultural programmes held across Europe, were symbolic manifestations of the Trio cooperation.