European Youth Event: an extraordinary experience to set the agenda for tomorrow’s Europe

Last weekend the Parliament building in Strasbourg hosted the European Youth Event 2014 (EYE 2014), an unique opportunity for the next generation to generate ideas, discuss opinions and set the agenda for tomorrow’s Europe.

Undoubtedly, the EYE 2014 has been one of the best experiences I ever had. Fantastic 3 days full of interesting debates and wonderful moments with other 5.000 European young mates, all of us sharing a dream: a better Europe. One conclusion: There are thousands and thousands of european youths committed towards creating another Europe, more democratic, social and federal.

During these 3 days, we took part in panel discussions on topics such as youth employment, the digital revolution and sustainability and talked about tour ideas for the future of Europe with politicians, journalists and other decision makers. According to the organisation, the EYE conclusions will be handed to the newly-elected MEPs during the first plenary in July.

In the following lines, I highlight the most important conclusions taken from the EYE:

·        Celebrate the EYE 2014 was an excellent idea. The EYE was an admirable idea and I firmly believe that it should be done at least twice during an European Parliament´s legislature (two years after the elections and 1 month before them). Web Pages such as the Ideas Lab (https://www.eye2014-ideaslab.eu/) should keep active in order so that the participants can write down and share our current and future ideas.

·        Excellent organisation of the event. More than 200 workshops and seminars took place with participants, including 180 speakers and MEPs. It was really well organised. In addition, we had the opportunity to explore stands run by various youth organisations (as for example: JEF (http://www.jef.eu/), ESN (http://esn.org/), etc.), while also enjoying activities and entertainment provided in the YO!Village and in YO!Fest. I had the opportunity to discover new initiatives as for example: http://www.loveyouthfuture.eu/ led by the European Youth Forum.

·        Youth employment is perceived as a priority that needs to be led at the European Level. Job culture is changing. European youth need and want good-quality, stable and sustainable employment. We want the EP and European Commission to define a long-term sustainable pathway and promote policies towards an equal and inclusive labour market providing quality jobs. The Youth Guarantee is not enough, it is simply a patch (especially useful for NEETs (Not Employment, Education and Training).

·        A more DEMOCRATIC EUROPEAN UNION was a common topic in all the discussions. A single European electoral system, enforcing the digital democracy and transparency needs to be a “must” for the new EP. We, the citizens, want to choose the president of the EU and also more instruments and policies supporting direct citizen participation. We desire the European Union to be a global “fair player” with a single voice (democraticly chosen). 

·        Political will to promote an European identity. Not only are we European but we also want to feel European citizens. Initiatives such as an European Passport and a definition of the common European values (being solidarity as one of the core values) have to be enforced.

·        Stop Austerity. We want a SOCIAL and SUSTAINABLE EUROPE, in which the Welfare stare is the core political and economic value.  Measures such as a basic income were extremely popular. We all agreed that the EU budget should be more focused on supporting environmentally sustainable economic growth and social cohesion. Programs like the New Deal for Europe were often acclaimed (http://www.newdeal4europe.eu/).

·        Enforce a minimum basis for the European Education, enforcing the vocational system (e.g. Austrian education system), and a political democratic culture.

·        Promote a more UNITED EUROPE, promoting more EU integration. In most of the debates, some of the participants stated that more competences should be transferred from the Member States to the EU institutions, in order to create a united Europe, moving towards a Federal Union

·        European Mobility needs to be enforced by the European institutions. There is a need of create more mobility programs and a better integral coordination of all the matters related to mobility, assuring the accessibility of all the social classes. However, the mobility should not be mandatory; no one should be forced to leave their own country.

·        Lack of national press coverage of the EYE 2014. In my opinion, the national institutions and media should have focused on spreading the event and its conclusions. It would have contributed towards generating a pro-european feeling and to show the commitment of the European Youth with a better EU.

As I said, it was a really nice experience. Thank you specially to all the members of JEF-Europe and JEF-Catalunya for giving me the opportunity to participate. I am pretty sure, that one of the best assets that the current European Union has is all the youths committed to work and fight for a better Europe. There is hope. The challenge now is how use this energy and ideas to move forward the EU.