First Vice-President ofthe Commission Frans Timmermans introduced the debate of the public hearing on the European Citizens’ Initiative (ECI) by highlighting the great synergy between the ECI and the EU institutions. According to Mr. Timmermans the ECI has worked, but arguably it has not worked well enough so far, mentioning the discrepancy and the perception across the European society.
On that aspect Vice-President added that ECI cannot solve everything, although it constitutes one of the building blocks on the promotion of mutual trust between citizens. Mr. Timmermans expressed strongly his support to ECI and said that he felt a personal responsibility to improve this initiative, as he was there at its conception during the Convention. He pointed out that the remarks at the today’s public hearing would feed his thinking and contribute to Commission’s next step namely: the report on the ECI to be presented in April.
On the legal aspect, he emphasized the importance of strengthening the legal framework and added that there might be legal reasons to admit an ECI, but that does not prevent a political dialogue on the proposed topics. Mr. Timmermans referred to the minorities, a core business of EC, and added that in the end of October there will be a resolution on the fight against anti-semitism and islamophobia.
Finally, Vice-President flagged up the need of preservation of the political value of the ECI, and claimed that in order to broaden the public knowledge and interest of this initiative, there should be given a political impetus on it.