Eurodiaconia co-organised a breakfast meeting in the European Parliament, together with its German member Diakonie Deutschland, the Green group and CESI. This meeting provided an opportunity for representatives from the European Parliament, European Commission, trade unions and civil society organisation to discuss the challenging current situation of stakeholders involvement in the European Semester at national level.
This meeting called for a more inclusive, more balanced and meaningful stakeholders involvement in the European Semester. Heather Roy spoke of Eurodiaconia members experience in the process and insisted on the importance of the European Commission to provide guidelines to Member States on a model for civil society involvement involving churches and diaconal organisations.
Jean-Paul Tricart, Head of Unit Social Dialogue, DG Employment and Social Affairs recognised that for him the European Semester was a success in terms of coordination, but not in terms of communication. He highlighted the novelty and complexity of the process as reasons for a difficult stakeholders involvement.
Eurodiaconia will keep sharing members experience of the national processes and working for an improved process at national level, in particular through the joint Semester/CSR European alliance.