Committee of the Regions President Karl-Heinz Lambertz (PES, Belgium), Michael Schneider (EPP, Germany) and François Decoster (ALDE, France) will be the three representatives on the Subsidiarity Task Force, the CoR announced at the conference on subsidiarity held in Vienna on Monday 4 December.
The European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker announced in his State of the European Union speech in September that a working group was to be set up to produce recommendations on how better to apply the principles of subsidiarity and proportionality by 15 July 2018. The aim is to give close consideration to the action to be taken by the EU of the future so that it can be focused on areas where can bring genuine added value. This principle already features in the reflection document on EU financing (see EUROPE 11905).
The task force will be chaired by Frans Timmermans, First Vice-President of the European Commission with responsibility for Better Regulation. The full list of members is not yet known. Three members remained to be appointed from the national parliaments and three from the European Parliament. It is due to get down to work in January.
In the view of CoR President Lambertz, the role of the task force is crucial and will help to clarify “the Europe we want to go for in the future”. He says that “clear” proposals need to be brought forward before the 2019 European elections. (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)