Youth Agenda

Launch Event

On 20 March 2009 the European Youth Forum launches its main expectations of the next European Parliament and European Commission.

A New Parliament, a New Commission, a New Youth Agenda for the EU!

Launch of the New Youth Agenda for the EU: youth organisations put forward 15 specific proposals for a more youth-friendly EU.

The event will start with a welcome and presentation of the YFJ’s New Youth Agenda for the EU, Xenia Constantinou, YFJ Vice-President. Followed by the presentation of the EU’s main challenges for 2009—2014 (Keynote intervention by Pat Cox, President of the European Movement International (tbc))

A panel debate with 5 young candidates to the next European Elections, will take place and will count with the presence of:

• Marilyn Neven (BE), European People’s Party
• Anne Fairweather (UK), Party of European Socialists
• Ivo Thijssen (NL), European Liberal Democrats
• Olivier Biérin (BE), European Green Party
• Thomas Leys (BE), European Free Alliance

Moderated by Johan Ekman, YFJ Bureau Member

The event will be followed by a small reception.

WHEN: Friday 20 March
WHERE: Radisson SAS EU Hotel, Rue d’Idalie, 35, Brussels, Belgium.

Youth Agenda

At the beginning of June this year, the EU citizens will elect a new European Parliament for a five year term. In November, a new Commission should also be installed. Anticipating this changing of the guard in the EU institutions, the European Youth Forum (YFJ) formulated its main expectations for the next mandate of the European Parliament and the European Commission.

The YFJ’s Proposals for a new Youth Agenda for the EU: the YFJ’s main expectations of the next mandate of the European Parliament & European Commission (2009-2014), adopted by the General Assembly, contain fifteen proposals in the fields of education, civil society and citizenship, participation and youth policy mainstreaming, human rights, employment and social affairs, such as, among others:

• A framework for quality assurance in Non-Formal Education;
• Ensured student representation in educational institutions;
• A legal statute for European associations;
• A period abroad for every young European through expended and improved mobility programmes;
• Tackling youth issues across the board with a Group of Commissioners on youth and a parliament intergroup on youth mainstreaming;
• A European framework for the rights of the volunteer;
• Lowering the voting age to 16 for all elections;
• A new EU Strategy for Social and Sustainable Development as a follow-up to the Lisbon Strategy, including a renewed European Youth Pact.

These proposals will be presented to the press, European Institutions, parties and candidates running for the European Parliament in a launch event on 20 March in Brussels.  The Youth Agenda will continue to serve as an advocacy tool throughout the next mandate of the EU Institutions and as a yardstick for the evaluation in 2014.