Brussels, 02/02/2004 (Agence Europe) - Presenting his mid-term assessment last Thursday, the President of the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC), Roger Briesch, notes that much progress had been made but problems remained in areas like the financial status of advisors and partnership with the European Parliament, the Council and also the Committee of the Regions (CoR). Overall, said President Briesch, I have the feeling that the EESC has every reason to be satisfied with its activity in past months, and I hope that this year will also be characterised by a more sustained commitment by all our members. His words were supported by the Presidents of the three groups at the EESC (employers, workers and other interests).
In terms of presenting the opinions of the EESC (which he would like to be briefer, more accessible, readable and interesting), Briesch said that exploratory opinions had a considerable political impact since they provided an opportunity to shake things up. He noted that good cooperative relations had been established with the Commission for the drawing up of such opinions> He regretted, however, the lack of any great progress towards the signing of partnership and cooperation agreements with the Council and Parliament. He commented that it was not easy to make progress with the Council, given the nature of the institution but there was little progress to be reported regarding relations with the Parliament either. He said politically, the EESC had a good relationship with the Committee of the Regions but attempts to establish a more systematic cooperation had not progressed very far. Briesch hoped that with the change in leadership in February, there would be positive changes in this connection.
On the IGC, Roger Briesch said that the new Constitution would invite the EESC to structured civil dialogue and they had to be prepared for this. He said it was essential for the reputation and the capacity of the EESC for it to make it clear that they would not fail to achieve this. In this connection, the deepening of relations with the European social partners is close to President Briesch's heart, and he announced the organisation of a conference on 8 and 9 March by the EESC on Participatory Democracy, looking at the current state of play and the prospects provided by the European Constitution. Briesch said he was disappointed that the IGC had started to unpick the draft Constitution which the EESC viewed as positive (see EUROPE of 24 December, p.4). He added that the failure of the IGC in December 2003 resulted from an approach whereby certain governments only considered their own national interests. It also revealed the very restrictive limits of diplomacy when it comes to drawing up plans for the future of Europe.
Upon his election as President of the EESC in October 2002, Roger Briesch mentioned four priority areas he would be focussing on, namely 1) optimising the advisory role of the EESC at the European Parliament, the Council and the Commission, by intensifying cooperation; 2) enhancing the representativeness and credibility of the EESC as the institutional representative of civil society; 3) developing the EESC's resources and internal structures; and 4) boosting the EESC's presence in the debate on the future of Europe (see EUROPE of 26 October and 14 December 2002).