The Liaison Group of the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC) has set to work on an ambitious programme aiming to improve dialogue and collaboration between European institutions and organised civil society after its role being revamped in 2011. On 7th March a meeting was held to allow the European organisations members of Liaison Group to discuss on priority themes and prepare some of the planned initiatives.

The first part of the meeting was dedicated to the preparation of a Civil society day 2012 in May, an event which will be jointly organised by the Economic and social committee (EESC) and the Liaison Group. The programme, now still at the stage of a draft, will include two sessions and three workshops about participation of civil society in decision-making processes in light also of the current crisis and on how to implement article 11 of the TEU.

One of five headline targets in the Europe 2020 strategy for “smart”, sustainable, and inclusive growth is for the 27 EU member states together to lift 20 million people out of poverty. The “European Platform Against Poverty” (EPAP) is a key plank in the EU’s struggle to achieve this target, although it remains a vaguely defined initiative. A first annual convention of the EPAP was held in Krakow in October last year.

But many participants in stakeholders in the meeting were disappointed by the way it was organised and the quality of the discussion that was possible. Given that this is a major high profile event which is time consuming and expensive to organise, many stakeholders are demanding more from the commission in future years.

On 6 February a stakeholder meeting was held in Brussels to allow interested organisations to discuss with the officials in the Commission who are responsible for organising this weeks event, led by Anne DeGrand. She said that following the extensive debriefing of the first convention in Krakow the Commission had taken on board the following main points:

- there had been a lack of feeling of shared ownership - the Commission had found it difficult to make all stakeholders feel included and they intended to remedy this from now on.
- there had not been enough time for discussion, and too many set speeches
- the whole affair had been prepared in too much of a rush, and this year will be prepared well in advance.