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On 10 March, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, European Parliament President David Sassoli and Portuguese Prime Minister António Costa signed off on the plan for the Conference on the Future of Europe (CoFoE).

The CoFoE is to be launched on 9 May, which is Europe Day. The Conference ‘is a citizens-focused, bottom-up exercise for Europeans to have their say on what they expect from the European Union. It will give citizens a greater role in shaping the Union’s future policies and ambitions, improving its resilience. It will do so through a multitude of Conference-events and debates organised across the Union, as well as through an interactive multilingual digital platform’. More information on its aims and format can be found in the Joint Declaration.

The active involvement of organised civil society organisations like Social Platform and its pan-European member networks is key in making the CoFoE a success and to ensure that the voices of people in all their diversity are heard. Civil society organisations represent the interests of all people, including those who are in the most vulnerable situations and underrepresented in policy-making. They also represent social economy actors and not-for-profit social service providers, who support millions of people in their day-to-day lives. Civil society organisations can therefore contribute crucial expertise to ensure that policies and legislation correspond to the lived realities of people, including those in the most vulnerable situations who, otherwise, are often not reached by mainstream policies.