Wallström wants to use schools to boost ‘limited’ knowledge of EU

Margot Wallström, the European commissioner for communication, will next week urge member states to use schools and political parties to give citizens more information about the EU.

The paper ‘Communicating Europe in Partnership’, drafted by Wallström, sets out proposals for an enhanced communication policy for the EU.

Recognising that member states are sensitive about the European Commission getting involved in communicating about the EU, the paper to be presented on 3 October, says that citizens’ "limited" knowledge of the EU, its institutions and policies should first be addressed by member states through their educational systems and national and European political parties. The paper says that communication on European issues is "the responsibility of all those involved in the EU decision-making process". It proposes an inter-institutional agreement which would enable the EU institutions to develop a "common annual work plan around selected EU communications priorities".

The paper puts emphasis on active participation of citizens and on communication projects targeted at local level. It proposes extending an existing project to put additional communication staff in Commission representations in member states.

The paper highlights the importance of audiovisual media as a source of information on EU affairs and proposes offering multi-annual contracts for networks of EU-wide broadcasters to produce and broadcast programmes about EU affairs. In response to criticism that the Commission wanted control over the content of such programmes, the paper says that the contracts will contain a "binding editorial charter guaranteeing the editorial freedom of operators".

The Commission is also planning to propose a doubling of the capacity of the Europe by Satellite (EbS) broadcast service to deal with increasing demands for airtime and conflict between the Commission’s press conferences and coverage of the European Parliament’s plenary and committee meetings.

In a separate development, Wallström has dropped her bid to get a reference to communication in the new reform treaty. The commissioner said at the informal foreign ministers’ meeting in Viana do Castelo on 7-8 September that a clause on communicating Europe to citizens should be included in the reform treaty. But she has not made a formal proposal to add new language on communication, according to her spokesman.

Wallström told European Voice in July: "Ideally we would have in the treaty a rather general text mentioning the right of citizens to information and the institutions’ obligation to inform."

She admitted at the time that it would be difficult to add such a reference as it was not included in the mandate for negotiating the treaty, but added: "I will do my best. I will make sure that all arguments will be presented to the member states in the IGC [intergovernmental conference]."

A Portuguese presidency official said that if the Commission had made a formal proposal it would have been rejected, as the addition of any new elements to the treaty which were not included in the mandate agreed by EU leaders in June was opposed.

UK Liberal Democrat Andrew Duff, one of the three MEPs taking part in the IGC, said that Wallström’s suggestion to include a reference to communication had been met "with interest" in the IGC but had not been taken up by delegations.

Margot Wallström, the European commissioner for communication, will next week urge member states to use schools and political parties to give citizens more information about the EU.