Reverse the trend towards “recentralization” and call for “more participatory governance” within the European Union, with full participation of the regions in matters over which they have jurisdiction in their countries. That is the objective of the 15 European regions, all of them with legislative powers, integrated in the RLEG group and that this Wednesday have signed a joint declaration in Bilbao that will be transferred to Brussels.
The ordinary meeting of the RLEG in the Basque Country took place under the presidency of the Lehendakari, Iñigo Urkullu, and was attended by the Minister President of Flanders, Jan Jambon, or the Minister for Foreign Action of the Generalitat, Meritxell Serret, among others. The Bilbao Declaration has been signed by the governments of the Balearic Islands, the Valencian Community, Catalonia, the Basque Country, Corsica, Sardinia, Carinthia, Flanders, Lower Austria, Upper Austria, Salzburg, Tyrol, Piedmont, Voralberg, Aland Islands, Azores and Madeira, 15 the 17 regions integrated into the RLEG group.
In this statement they defend that the “common” solutions of the EU to face the latest crises, such as the pandemic or the war in Ukraine, and the challenges of the digital and ecological transition, cannot be at the cost of “weakening” self-government and the powers of the regions.
“It is time to reverse the recentralization trend and call for a more participatory governance,” says the text, which estimates that the “democratic legitimacy” of the Union and the “involvement” of the citizenry depends on recognizing the regions as the institutions closer.
For this reason, they demand the “full participation” of the regions in EU decision-making, especially in matters in which they have jurisdiction within their States, through an inter-institutional forum to previously “influence” the design of the measures.
In the opinion of the RLEG group, there is a “real potential to reinforce the democratic legitimacy of the EU by including the role of regions with legislative powers in the design and implementation of European policies that respond to the needs of European citizens”. Thus, they have indicated that they will continue to take steps to “further strengthen the role of the RLEG regions in the multilevel governance system of the EU”.
The Lehendakari, Iñigo Urkullu, considered it “more necessary than ever” to create a new model of European governance with “voice and decision-making capacity” for “small countries, nations or regions with legislative capacity”. “Europe cannot put aside those who are a little smaller just because they are,” he added.
“We demand that the regions with legislative powers and constitutional nationalities be formally recognized as having a unique role in European governance,” said Urkullu, who recalled that 45% of the EU population lives in the 71 autonomous regions that there are in seven of the states that make up the EU.
For her part, the Minister of Foreign Action of the Generalitat, Meritxel Serret, has stated that the declaration reinforces them and is a “step forward” within a deep “European sense and vocation”, which “shares” Catalonia.
Serret has affirmed that they want to be a “proactive” partner for the construction of the European project and, in his speech, he has also alluded to the principle of subsidiarity and has indicated that there are “challenges” that require being “much more effective and efficient”.
Likewise, he has ensured that citizens are asking for “multilevel governance to be strengthened” and “their voice in European policies”. Serret added that they want to contribute to this path for a “more inclusive and cohesive” Europe in which everyone is heard “in their diversity”.
The autonomous secretary for the EU and External Relations of the Generalitat Valenciana, Joan Calabuig, has emphasized that what is being proposed today is a pro-European initiative and not “an initiative against Europe”.
As he has stated, what they seek is to reinforce the democratic legitimacy of the EU through the participation and “greater inclusion” of the regions with legislative powers.
For his part, the President of Flanders has criticized the “too centralized” approach of the EU recovery funds, which for effectiveness wants a single interlocutor per State “but produces the opposite effect, less effectiveness and less efficiency.”
“There is a setback and very little account is taken of the regions”, denounced Jambon, who has maintained that the democratic legitimacy of the European Union is achieved “from the bottom up, with the support of the regions”.
In his opinion, despite the moment of crisis that the entire EU is going through, “it is not so difficult” to increase the participation of the regions in decision-making in the Union if there is “political will”.
The president of the Executive Council of Corsica, Gilles Simeoni, has thanked by videoconference – he has suspended the trip to Bilbao due to the political situation in France – the participation in the RLEG although it does not yet have autonomy or legislative powers, which he hopes to achieve in the coming months in the negotiations that it maintains with the French Government.
Simeoni has considered that reinforcing the link with the EU goes through the “human communities that represent the regions”.
The RLEG will present the declaration approved in Bilbao in Brussels as part of an operation to try to promote the adhesion to this group of more self-governing regions, especially some of the German lander.
