Governance and citizenship

When it comes to deciding between the subsidiarity principle and the EU's competition rules, it must not always be the latter that wins. This was one of the messages to the EU Presidency that CEMR President and mayor of Vienna Michael Häupl gave to the Austrian Chancellor Wolfgang Schûssel at their meeting in Vienna on 10 March 2006.

 

The meeting gave CEMR's President, together with Secretary-General Jeremy Smith, the opportunity to present the local and regional government perspective on a wide range of key current issues to Mr Schûssel on behalf of the Austrian Presidency.

 

 

Discussing the future of Europe

 

On the future of Europe (and what will become of the European Constitution), the CEMR president suggested that Parts I and II of the Constitution were of a different character from many of the detailed policies set out in Part III. He recalled that, in their Laeken Declaration which launched the process back in 2001, the heads of government had foreseen a possible difference in treatment between these two kinds of provisions.

 

Mr Häupl recalled CEMR's welcome for the Constitution's provisions that gave a stronger role to local and regional government - such as on subsidiarity - but said CEMR would ideally like to see the European Charter of Local Self-Government expressly included in any future constitutional text, making it part of the 'acquis communautaire" (the EU's body of accepted rules). He welcomed the Austrian government's willingness to make progress in the debate on the future of Europe.

 

Mr Schûssel felt it was as yet too early to talk of an outcome to the debate on the Constitution, for which there were three possibilities: to change the text, to change the context, or to change the method (e.g. an EU-wide referendum held at one time to decide the question). He indicated the importance of the Steering Committee of the 5 Presidencies (2005-2007) to work out a road map for the future, to be realised in 2007.

 

Services, SIGs and cohesion policy

 

On the issue of the "services directive" and services of general interest, Mr Häupl said that local government felt the recent compromise vote in the European Parliament was fairly OK, though he felt it risked leaving too many decisions to the EU Court of Justice: Politics should be made by the politicians, not by the courts, he added.

 

Wolfgang Schüssel also felt that the compromise by the European Parliament was an acceptable one, which the Council would probably follow. He did not envisage any further major change of direction in relation to the directive.

 

CEMR's President also took the opportunity to express some concern over decisions taken to reduce funding for Structural Funds (2007-13), as part of the overall 7 year EU budget. He was concerned at the overall reduction proposed by the European Council last December under the UK Presidency, but in particular at the cuts proposed for co-operation between Europe's local and regional governments (it has been proposed that this element should only be about half of what the European Commission had proposed).

 

Finally, Mr Häupl explained that CEMR was committed to working with the local and regional governments in South East Europe, to help them build capacity. This co-operation, at all levels, was essential if we are to build a more secure and prosperous region there. He indicated CEMR's support for the Austrian government's focus on this region.

 

Mr Schûssel expressed concern that some European politicians wanted to defer all decisions on possible EU candidate country status until all EU troops had left the region.

 

The CEMR President thanked the Chancellor warmly for this opportunity to exchange views on these issues. He recalled that CEMR is holding its 3 yearly General Assembly in Innsbruck from 10 to 12 May 2006, and hoped the Chancellor would be able to accept CEMR's invitation to take part.

 

Pictures available: patrizio.fiorilli@ccre-cemr.org