Courtesy Translation
Dear Madam President,
Dear Mr President,
Together with my colleagues at the Bundesrat and at the Portuguese and Slovenian Parliaments,
I am pleased to be able to send to you the declaration by our parliaments on the running of the
parliamentary dimension of the Trio Presidency of the Council of the European Union, signed at
a video conference on 29 June 2020.
With the slogan Working towards
a stronger post-crisis
Europe , our Trio Presidency aims to
assist us in viewing the current situation as an opportunity to learn from the experience of the
COVID-19
pandemic and its impact on the health and the lives of Europe’s citizens, as well as
on
our economy and society. At the same time, we also aim to focus on how we can make the
European Union more innovative and dynamic. In order to achieve this, we plan to boost
interparliamentary activities over the next 18 months, and in this way play an active role in EU
policy on tackling the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic.
In addition, we wish to use the Trio Presidency to make a substantial contribution towards other
central areas of European policy. These include the negotiations on the next Multiannual
Financial Framework and the recovery plan, on the Green Deal and achieving an innovative,
economically strong, and social Europe. Not least, we are keen to hold an exchange of views from
a parliamentary perspective on Europe’s position in the world and the European Union’s
responsibility as a global player.
Lastly, we intend to further increase the use of digital technologies in order to strengthen
interparliamentary exchange, and to take concrete practical measures to boost sustainability,
including in the operation of our own parliaments.
With our Trio Declaration, we wish to send a signal indicating that despite the current
restrictions, cooperation between parliaments in the European Union can be deepened on a
sustainable basis and can contribute in a key way to Europe emerging from the crisis stronger
than before.
We suggest also making this letter available to the Members of your Parliament.
Yours sincerely,
Sgd. Dr Wolfgang Schäuble
President of the German Bundestag