Strasbourg, 1^st July 2010                                                                    CDLR-Bu(2010)11

Item 6 of the agenda

BUREAU OF THE

EUROPEAN COMMITTEE ON LOCAL AND REGIONAL DEMOCRACY

(CDLR)

COMMITTEE OF THE REGIONS – DEVELOPMENT OF

AN INSTRUMENT ON MULTI-LEVEL GOVERNANCE

Secretariat Memorandum

prepared by the

Directorate General of Democracy and Political Affairs

Directorate of Democratic Institutions

This document is public. It will not be distributed at the meeting. Please bring this copy.

Ce document est public. Il ne sera pas distribué en réunion. Prière de vous munir de cet exemplaire.

Introduction

The Committee of the Regions, established by the Treaty of Maastricht (Treaty on European Union, 7 February 1992), is “the political assembly that provides the regional and local levels with a voice in EU policy development and EU legislation”.

On 19 June 2009, the Committee adopted a White Paper on Multilevel Governance[1] that “puts forward the parameters for promoting multilevel governance as the preferred model or process of coming to binding decisions within the EU”[2]. According to the White Paper, multilevel governance means “co-ordinated action by the European Union, the member states and local and regional authorities, based on partnership and aimed at drawing up and implementing EU policies”[3].

The Committee of the Regions has recently embarked on the task of drawing up a “European charter on multilevel governance” which would “establish the principles and methods for developing a common and shared understanding of European governance, based on respect for the principle of subsidiarity, which would support local and regional governance and the process of decentralisation in the Member states, candidate countries and neighbouring states, and which would stand as a guarantee of the political will to respect the independence of local and regional authorities and their involvement in the European decision making-process”[4].

An “atelier” on the elaboration of such European charter – to which the Council of Europe was invited to make a contribution – has recently been held at the CoR in Brussels. Further work leading to the eventual drafting of a Charter will be undertaken.

A European Union charter on multilevel governance would need to take into account and inter-relate with the relevant instruments of the Council of Europe such as the European Charter of Local Self-government and its Additional protocol and in general with the Council of Europe’s acquis in this field, including the Strategy for innovation and good governance at local level.

In this connection, it is worth recalling that at Utrecht, the Ministers agreed that “decisions by international organisations and structures contrary to the acquis of the Council of Europe in the field of local and regional democracy (be) avoided” and that “a coherent approach is adopted and information between member States about possible implications before decisions are  taken in these other fora (be) exchanged, as appropriate, in consultation with local and regional authorities”.

Action required

The Bureau is invited to take note of the information above and discuss possible follow up thereto.