Citizens' Panel supports European minimum wage

The European Union (EU) should introduce a minimum wage and support the targeted provision of social housing in member states. These are two of 48 recommendations of a randomly selected EU Citizens' Panel that met in Dublin, Ireland, from 25 to 27 February 2022.

After a weekend of deliberations in Dublin Castle, 200 citizens from across the EU voted to adopt a set of 48 far-reaching recommendations. These recommendations will now be forwarded to the European Parliament. The Citizens' Panel was part of the Conference on the Future of Europe.

Closing session in Dublin

Participants in the Citizens' Forum had met in Dublin to formulate and vote on their recommendations, following previous meetings in Strasbourg and online.

The panel's recommendations include the introduction of an EU minimum wage based on the cost of living in each member state and increased EU efforts to prevent tax evasion. Panel participants also voted 83 per cent in favour of EU action to support the targeted provision of social housing.

Right to "work smart"

The panel also recommended the introduction of an EU right to "smart working", which would give workers in the EU the right to work from home or elsewhere. Another proposal deals with the education systems in the EU member states: According to the Citizens' Panel, these should be harmonised with due regard for national differences. One goal is to ensure that degrees and training are recognised in all member states. In addition, the participants advocate in their recommendation that infrastructure should be state property - in order to prevent monopolies, especially in the digital world.

The Citizens' Panel was tasked with deliberating on a range of European issues including: The economy, social justice and jobs, education, culture, youth and sport, and the digital transformation. Panellists were randomly selected by specialist contractors, who ensured that they reflected the EU’s diversity in terms of geographic origin, gender, age, socioeconomic background and level of education.

Conference plenary discusses recommendations

The recommendations of the Citizens' Panel, together with ideas on the same topics coming from the national Citizens' Panels organised by Member States, were presented and discussed in the plenary of the Conference on the Future of Europe at the European Parliament in Strasbourg on 11 March 2022.

The plenary of the conference discussed the recommendations of the national and European citizens' forums as well as the contributions collected by the multilingual online platform, grouped by themes. The plenary submited its proposals to the Executive Committee on a consensus basis. The Executive Committee prepared a report in cooperation with the Plenary. The report was submitted to the Presidents of the Parliament, the Council and the European Commission. These have undertaken to follow up the recommendations.

Citizens members of the Conference Plenary

80 citizens (20 from each of the European Citizens' Forums, at least one third of whom are between 16 and 25 years old) were members of the Conference Plenary. There they presented the results of their respective panel discussions and debate with Members of the European Parliament, national government and parliamentary representatives, EU Commissioners and other plenary members from EU institutions, regional and local authorities, social partners and civil society.

The Conference Plenary met on 25-26 March and 8-9 April 2022 to develop proposals for EU action based on the ideas submitted on the Conference Platform and the recommendations of the Citizens' Forums.

Calls for action taken on

The 48 recommendations from the EU Citizens’ Forum on ‘A stronger economy, social justice and employment / education, culture, youth and sport / digital transformation’, held in February 2022, were incorporated into the final proposals of the Conference on the Future of Europe.

Particular emphasis was placed on calls for adequate minimum wages and better working conditions, for stronger social protection, and for a secure and people-centred digital transformation. Subsequent measures include, amongst others, EU rules on adequate minimum wages and platform work, the expansion of digital infrastructure and digital education, stronger rules on cybersecurity, as well as the Act on Artificial Intelligence and the Digital Services Act.

Recommendations that remain partially unaddressed

By contrast, some recommendations remain partially unaddressed, including a binding right to be offline, more far-reaching regulations on minimum income and social housing, an EU-wide voting age of 16, and individual proposals on data protection and trustworthy digital information services.

As numerous relevant initiatives had already been launched before the Citizens’ Forum, the subsequent measures cannot be attributed solely to its recommendations.