Tuesday, 20 February
12:30-14:30
Stanhope Hotel
Over the past few months Brussels has been full of calls for systemic EU reforms, a treaty overhaul that’s presented as inevitable if the EU wants to remain functional with over thirty members once the next enlargement wave takes place.
However, treaty change in the EU has always been a one-way street: giving more power to Brussels and further eroding member states’ sovereignty in a relentless march toward an increasingly federalist future.
And that’s exactly what’s happening now, only on a scale vastly larger than anytime before. A series of reform proposals were put forward by the European Parliament late last year, perfectly outlining the EU mainstream’s long-term intentions, while the public is being intentionally kept in the dark.
Among others, these proposals include scrapping member states’ veto power so that no individual country can say no to EU policies that might go against their national interests; transferring several key policy areas under EU competence, including foreign and defense policy, environmental policies, border control, and even public health; and creating transnational constituencies and EU citizenship with voting rights for “mobile” citizens.
MEP Jacek Saryusz-Wolski, the European Conservatives and Reformists’ shadow rapporteur described his experience of being privy to the EU mainstream’s closed-door negotiations: the EU “as a community of sovereign states is being abolished and a superstate is being created without any consent of the people, … where a political oligarchy can rule unaccountably and escape the democratic control of citizens.”
These proposals will be among the most important decisions of the coming legislative term (2024-2029). That’s why Europeans should be fully informed about their implications before they head to the ballots this June.
In our next panel discussion, we’ll bring together three conservative lawmakers to discuss what exactly is being proposed here, what it would mean for the future of Europe, and how will it affect not only nation-states but ordinary Europeans and democracy itself.
Entry is free but registration is compulsory.
Register HERE.
PROGRAMME
12:15-12:30 Arrivals & Registration
12:30-13:30 Panel Discussion
13:30-14:30 Lunch Reception
MEET THE SPEAKERS
Ryszard Legutko currently a Member of the European Parliament, Co-Chairman of the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) group, and head of the Polish Law and Justice (PiS) party’s European delegation. He is the former Education Minister of Poland and Secretary of State in the Chancellery of President Lech Kaczyński. He is also a professor of philosophy at the Jagiellonian University.
Jacek Saryusz-Wolski is currently a Member of the European Parliament, member of the Polish Law and Justice (PiS) delegation, and former Vice-President of the European Parliament. He was the first Polish European Affairs minister, architect and negotiator of Poland’s EU membership, and the Chairman of the EP Foreign Affairs Committee.
Gerolf Annemans is currently a Member of the European Parliament and the head of Vlaams Belang (Flemish Interest)’s delegation within the Identity and Democracy (ID) group in the European Parliament. He was co-founder and former chairman of the ID Group’s predecessor, the Movement for a Europe of Nations and Freedom (MENF).
