National Assembly archive
The Vice-president of the European Commission responsible for Inter-institutional relations and Administration Maroš Šefčovič presented the Annual Work Programme of the European Commission 2012 at the Bulgarian National Assembly.
09/02/2012
The Vice-president of the European Commission responsible for Inter-institutional Relations and Administration Mr Maroš Šefčovič met with the President of Bulgaria’s National parliament and was greeted in Plenary Hall of the National Assembly. He is on a visit in Bulgaria at the invitation of Ms Monika Panayotova, Chairwoman of the Committee on European Affairs and Oversight of European Funds.
The Commissioner Šefčovič as a special guest of the National Assembly presented before chairpersons and members of standing committees the key priorities within the Annual Work Programme of the European Commission.
Bulgaria has fulfilled the criteria for membership in the Schengen and should already be a member of visa-free space, said in a statement to the media the Vice-president of the European Commission responsible for Inter-institutional relations and Administration.
As for the Commission’s interim report is concerned, Mr Maroš Šefčovič noted that it provides just technical evaluation and the political reporting is expected in July. According to the Commissioner, the report presents the current state of Bulgaria’s progress over the past six months. There is some recommendations to the parliament and the government for measures that should be taken in the coming months. We appreciate Bulgaria's progress so far and would like to encourage it to work in the future as we share Bulgaria’s position that the report presents advices in this regard, noted Mr Maroš Šefčovič. He declared the readiness of the European Commission to help our country for a positive outcome of July’s report.
Maroš Šefčovič praised the work of the parliamentary committee for European affairs and Oversight of European funds for the submitted opinions on legislative proposals to the European Parliament. The year 2011 was a great success, National Assembly has ruled on 21 proposals to the European Commission, has exercised the right to say "no" to some proposals, said Ms Monica Panayotova, Chairwoman of the Committee on European Affairs. She added that in the last year the National Assembly has completed more than 70 percent of its Annual Working Program for the European Union issues.
Commissioner Šefčovič noted that cooperation between the Bulgaria’s national parliament and European Commission will become increasingly important in the future, as we enter increasingly in an era of economic management where responsibilities are expected to be shared. This requires an entire new way of cooperation, said at the end Mr Šefčovič .
At the meeting, National Assembly’s President Ms Tsacheva opened the floor for discussion. According to the President of Bulgaria’s National parliament, the visit of Commissioner Šefčovič is a sign of deeper cooperation between the European Commission and the Bulgarian Parliament. She noted with satisfaction that at the bilateral meeting with her guest, Mr Šefčovič has given high praise for the way the national parliament works with the European institutions.
Parliament’s President said that it has become a routine a member of the European Commission to present the Annual Work Programme of the European Commission before the European Affairs Committee of the National Assembly. This is extremely valuable and important to Bulgaria’s National parliament, because it makes possible to identify such priorities for the Bulgarian government and parliament on issues that correspond to Bulgaria’s national interests, said Ms Tsacheva. I hope in 2012, we could show that the joint efforts of European institutions and national parliaments would bring the results expected by every citizens of the big European family, concluded Ms Tsacheva.
The dimensions of the crisis in Europe, policies to promote growth, tackling youth unemployment and the issue of ACTA trade agreement were among the themes of the wide debate the meeting has provoked between the Bulgarian parliamentarians and Commissioner Šefčovič.
The meeting was attended by Ambassadors of European Union Member States.