Youth Convention achieves complete gender balance

Date: 30/05/02

THE European Parliament has selected representatives for the youth version of the Convention.

The 32-strong assembly, whose members are aged 16-25, has an equal number of male and female representatives - unlike the main body which is dominated by men.

Germany has four members. France, Italy, UK, Spain and Austria each have three; Belgium, Portugal, Netherlands, Denmark, Finland and Greece have two each; and Ireland has one. Sweden and Luxembourg have no representatives.

The Convention, which will be held from 9-14 July, is designed to work with the 'adult' version and its findings will be reported to its chairman, Valéry Giscard d'Estaing.

Meanwhile, the Young European Federalists group has called on the Convention to simplify EU decision-making.

'The EU is too complex and bureaucratic,' the non-governmental organisation stated in its submission to last week's meeting. 'Citizens find it difficult to understand. This has led to fears of a Brussels superstate and these fears have to be tackled.

'We believe decisions should be taken as close as possible to the citizen and therefore demand a division of powers which maintains this principle.'

• Giscard d'Estaing has been criticised for failing to consider children's views.

Diane Sutton, of the European Children's Network, said: 'It is time to tackle the invisibility of more than 90 million European citizens - its children. Animals are mentioned in the EU Treaty but children are not. Coupled with this, children have been excluded from the discussions in the Youth Convention which is excluding children under the age of 18,' she said.

The European Parliament has selected representatives for the youth version of the Convention on the Future of Europe.

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