Emily O’Reilly, the European ombudsman, has recommended a set of changes to increase the visibility and effectiveness of the European Citizens’ Initiative.
The ECI was introduced in 2012 to give the public a direct means to influence EU legislation. Under its rules, the European Commission must examine any proposal that receives 1 million signatures within a 12-month period, including a population-related threshold from seven member states, and either produce legislation to support the proposal or give reasons for rejecting it.
After a four-month investigation, O’Reilly published a report on 4 March that recommends 11 changes. These include providing more “robust, consistent and comprehensible” reasoning to organisers on why their proposals are rejected, taking more note of the public debate generated by petition-gatherers, and working with the European Parliament to ensure that more people are involved in public hearings on the issues raised.
This article on Research Professional News is only available to Research Professional or Pivot-RP users.
Research Professional users can log in and view the article via this link
Pivot-RP users can log in and view the article via this link.