EU strategic priorities for 2017: Weakening Europe won’t defeat euroscepticism - Hoofdinhoud

The European Parliament, against the background of the Brexit vote and a number of economic and geopolitical challenges, today adopted a resolution setting out its strategic priorities for the European Commission in 2017.  

The cross-party resolution calls for more ambitious and effective European solutions, strongly anchored in a more democratic process, which aim to respond to EU citizens concerns about the big challenges the EU faces, from the economy, to attacks on fundamental rights and increasing security threats.  

Liberals and Democrats believe that the Commission should do more to focus on the bigger issues that EU citizens care about and must be more ambitious in putting in place measures to tackle these.

Commenting this afternoon, Sophie In ’t Veld MEP, Vice-President of the ALDE Group in the European Parliament said:

“We are discussing the Commission Work Programme at the most difficult moments in the history of European integration. The European Union is disintegrating at frightening speed. Anti-EU forces are on the rise, demolishing what has been built up over decades by the post war generations.”

“Against this backdrop, it’s important the work programme of the Commission is more than a mere list of legislative proposals, it must offer the outlines of a new European Union and it must offer a real prospect to the people of Europe. The EU needs to outline how it can respond to the big issues that people are concerned about”

“The knee jerk reflex to the current anti-EU mood is to weaken Europe even further, assuming that if we scrap a few more directives, people will suddenly embrace the European project: this is a flawed diagnosis”  

“People's existential anxieties will not be addressed by eliminating rules on vacuum cleaners or the curve of cucumbers. People are anxious and insecure because in just a few decades, the world has changed beyond recognition. Globalisation, the digital revolution and urbanisation have radically changed the way we live, while our communities have become much more diverse.”

“Our task must not be to scrap one or the other directive. Threats and opportunities are distributed differently today then one or two generations ago. The new dividing lines are reflected in the electorate. Not just in Europe, but also in the US and elsewhere. Our task is to offer a plan to heal the rifts in our societies”.

“It is a mistake to think we can weaken the anti-EU populists by weakening the EU. We have to make the EU stronger, more democratic and accountable, and more able to act and address the big challenges of today.”

“We all have a responsibility to offer a real prospect to all European citizens. A prospect of a Europe that provides both protection and opportunity. A Europe where everyone has a place. A place for all, young and old, city and countryside, men and women, people of all shapes and sizes, and all walks of life. This must be the message of the Commission work programme for 2017”.