Our 2020 Annual Report “Social solidarity despite the ‘gloom and zoom’ of the pandemic” is out

Social Platform has published its 2020 Annual Report “Social solidarity despite the ‘gloom and zoom’ of the pandemic”. The Report provides an overview of our work ensuring social justice and participatory democracy during the extraordinary and challenging year of the COVID-19 pandemic.

While the year 2000 brought the bigger crisis of our generation, Social Platform set out to engage with members to collect evidence on the impact of the pandemic on the communities they serve. We worked quickly to ensure that members’ voices and experiences were used to shape policy, through facilitating dialogue with EU leaders and decision-makers.

We nurtured constructive relationships with EU institutions and, when key processes for combatting the impact of COVID-19 fell short, such as the new EU Budget and the Recovery Plan, we were able to advocate for stronger and bolder action.

At the same time, we acknowledged and supported institutional commitments to the development of an Action Plan on the implementation of the European Pillar of Social Rights. We invested much of our own energy and resources into providing recommendations on how best to achieve the commitments of the Social Pillar.

We also embarked on ensuring that we are a learning platform, where we engage with our members and partners to support one another.

We continue reaching out beyond Brussels, promoting Europe’s shared values and creating a sense of ownership.

At the end of 2020, we celebrated our 25th anniversary and welcomed some of our former Presidents, to share the highlights of their time representing Social Platform, and to give us their helpful thoughts on the future direction of our network.

Piotr Sadowski, President of the Social Platform said: “Despite the many challenges of 2020, we can be proud of the work we accomplished. At the same time, as I said at the start of my term as Social Platform’s President, “complacency is not an option”, and so I really look forward to our continued journey and working with all of you for what I would love to see being Europe of real equality, social justice, resilience and, most importantly, care, love and compassion for one another.”

Read our Annual Report 2020 “Social solidarity despite the ‘gloom and zoom’ of the pandemic” here.