Member of European Parliament Tonino Picula, who was re-elected in June as a candidate of the Social Democratic Party of Croatia, states for European Western Balkans that there will be no specific committee or sub-committee in the new EP for EU enlargement, even though this idea was considered. However, he expects that the enlargement will be one of the important issues on the agenda of the European Parliament in the next five years.
Brussels-based portal Politico claimed that the idea of the formation of a committee or subcommittee dealing with the EU enlargement was seriously considered by the European Parliament. It reported that in September 2023 a document was drafted proposing that the number of committees in the EP be reduced from 20 to 15, and that bodies (“panels”) be formed to deal with EU enlargement, digital policy, health and defence. It was explained that the aim of such an initiative was to modernise the European Parliament.
The constitutive session of the new EP will begin tomorrow, with the election of the President and Vice-Presidents of this legislative body of the EU. The debate and vote on the re-election of Ursula von der Leyen as President of the European Commission will take place on Thursday.
Roberta Metsola is a candidate of the European People’s Party for another term as the President of the European Parliament. She has held this office since January 2022.
Picula, who was the Chair of the Working Group for the Western Balkans in the Committee on Foreign Affairs (AFET) and the Rapporteur for Montenegro in the previous EP, tells EWB that, during the first plenary session in Strasbourg, “we decide on many constituent issues, including the formation of committees, the number of their members and all other details, in order to successfully constitute the committees a week later in Brussels, before the summer break”.
“There was talk of forming new committees, as well as turning existing subcommittees into full committees. Political groups in Parliament have been seriously considering this issue recently. However, as it seems, there will be no change of the composition and status of the committees”, Tonino Picula explains.
Picula believes that, as far as the enlargement is concerned, this policy will be adequately represented in the new EP.
“It is certainly a topic of interest to many of my colleagues. In addition to the AFET Committee, where there are permanent rapporteurs for individual candidate countries, the work of the delegations for relations with individual countries, as well as the Working Group on the Western Balkans, which I chaired in the last five years, will also be important. For the articulation of the future enlargement policy in the EP, AFET remains the most important and vocal working body whose importance will definitely grow in these highly unstable geopolitical times”, Tonino Picula concludes.