Minister within the Office of the Prime Minister Carmelo Abela participated in the conference on the Future of Europe at the European Parliament in Strasbourg between the 22nd and 23rd of October 2021.
During his participation in the working group on migration, Minister Abela said that the new pact for migration needs to continue to be discussed and that, hopefully, a decision will be taken to manage the irregular migration better.
The conference’s main purpose is to serve as an opportunity for European citizens to debate on Europe’s challenges and priorities. The conference can be effective if citizens are at the core of the decision-making process. However, Minister Abela highlighted during his intervention that; “The success of this conference will depend firstly on how much we listen and secondly on how much we follow up.”
Under the agenda ‘Multilingual Digital Platform’, Minister Carmelo Abela explained that, for this conference to be effective, nobody should be left behind. He said that citizens from all walks of life must have the opportunity to participate and have their voice heard. Therefore, he said that; “We must pall work harder to draw more citizens into the conference process through the digital Platform to ensure that the outcomes genuinely reflect the citizens’ hopes and concerns.”
Minister Abela remarked that; “We are seeing clear signs that our citizens care about the future of our planet, and what the EU is doing to safeguard the quality of our air, our food, and our water.” The Minister also remarked that citizens are sending clear signals that they care about the health of our societies, with issues like social justice, gender equality and working conditions being topmost on their minds.
Concluding his address to the plenary, Minister Abela said that the future is not simply something we enter, but something we create. Malta will see that people who have not had the opportunity to contribute so far, will do so in the coming weeks and months, including more women and the older generation.
Source: Office of the Prime Minister