Each week we sum up Commission news of particular interest for the UK while also summarising UK events on EU-related subjects. All comments welcome at COMM-UK-PRESS@ec.europa.eu

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09/12/2016

European Solidarity Corps: New opportunities for young Europeans

Young Europeans will have new opportunities to gain invaluable experience, to develop their skills at the start of their career and to make a contribution to society, as the European Commission launched its European Solidarity Corps initiative on 7 December. The scheme is intended to create an EU-wide range of options for young people to be placed with a project either for volunteering or for a traineeship, an apprenticeship or a job for a period between 2 and 12 months. Interested young people between 17 and 30, who are EU citizens or legally residing in the EU can register with the European Solidarity Corps to engage in a broad variety of activities such as education, health, social integration, assistance in the provision of food, shelter construction, reception, support and integration of migrants and refugees, environmental protection or prevention of natural disasters.

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Q&A

Progress made under the European agenda on migration

The EU's efforts to tackle the refugee and migration crisis are achieving significant results, according to a Commission report published on 8 December, although greater efforts from member states are still needed to deliver the wider sharing of responsibility agreed by the Council.

There has been steady progress in implementing the EU-Turkey statement aiming to end irregular migration from Turkey to the EU and replace it with legal channels for the resettlement of refugees. Since March, arrivals have averaged 90 per day, compared to 10,000 in a single day in October last year. Return operations have continued to be carried out with an additional 170 persons returned since the third report, bringing the total number of persons returned under the statement to 1,187. However, important shortfalls remain, notably as regards the still too slow pace of returns from Greece to Turkey which has led to additional pressure on the Greek islands.

The report concludes that implementation of the EU's agreed scheme for relocating to other member states 160,000 asylum seekers who have already arrived in Greece and Italy has picked up speed, though much remains to be done. November saw 1,406 relocations, the highest monthly number so far, confirming a continuous positive trend, with relocation from Greece stabilising around 1,000 per month and relocation from Italy having increased significantly. In total, 8,162 persons have been relocated so far, 6,212 from Greece and 1,950 from Italy. The Commission considers that it should now be feasible to transfer all eligible relocation applicants in Greece and Italy to other member states by September 2017.

A third element of the EU's migration agenda is the legal resettlement directly to the EU of refugees from crisis-hit regions. Here member states have also continued to increase their efforts– offering legal and safe pathways to 13,887 people so far out of the 22,504 agreed under the July 2015 scheme. Since the previous report a record monthly number of 2,035 people have been resettled mainly from Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon. An additional 544 Syrian refugees have been resettled from Turkey, bringing the total number of resettlements from Turkey under the EU-Turkey statement to 2,761.

Finally, the Commission also adopted a fourth recommendation that takes stock of the progress achieved by Greece to put in place a fully functioning asylum system and sets out a process for the gradual resumption of transfers to Greece of asylum seekers who first entered the EU in Greece but have now moved to other countries.

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EU-Turkey statement – Q&A

All this week's key European Commission announcements can be found here

First press briefing by Michel Barnier, Chief negotiator for the Article 50 negotiations with the UK

In his first press briefing, Michel Barnier, Chief negotiator for the Article 50 negotiations with the UK, explained that the period for actual negotiations will be shorter than two years. Article 50 says that "EU treaties cease to apply to the country in question [leaving the EU] from the date of entry into force of the agreement, or within 2 years of the notification of the withdrawal". Mr Barnier clarified that once Article 50 is triggered, the Council will need to set guidance and this will take a few weeks. He also reminded that at the end of the process, still within the two-year period, the agreement needs to be ratified by the European Parliament, the European Council and the UK. As this ratification process may take around five months, this leaves less than 18 months to negotiate. Mr Barnier argued that if Article 50 is triggered by March 2017, it is safe to say an agreement could be reached by October 2018. He stressed four principles that are important from the EU's point of view: unity is the strength of the EU, rights and benefits of EU members, negotiations won't start before notification and the single market and its four freedoms are indivisible.

Michel Barnier's full speech

Car emissions: Commission opened infringement procedures against seven member states, including the UK, for breach of EU rules

On 8 December, the European Commission launched infringement procedures – the formal way to ensure that agreed and adopted EU law and rules are implemented in practice – against seven EU member states, including the UK. The infringement cases against Germany, Luxembourg, Spain and the United Kingdom – the member states that issued type approvals for Volkswagen Group in the EU – are for not applying their national provisions on penalties despite the company's use of illegal defeat device software. The UK and Germany also refused to disclose, when requested by the Commission, all the technical information gathered in their national investigations regarding potential nitrogen oxide (NOx) emissions irregularities in cars made by Volkswagen Group and other car manufacturers on their territories. The other three member states (the Czech Republic, Greece and Lithuania) failed to set up penalties systems to deter car manufacturers from violating car emissions legislation.

A letter of formal notice is a first step in an infringement procedure and constitutes an official request for information. The member states now have two months to respond to the arguments put forward by the Commission; otherwise, the Commission may decide to send a reasoned opinion and ultimately, if matters are not rectified, to refer the member states concerned to the European Court of Justice.

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Q&A

PISA 2015 survey: UK outspends other developed economies on education

The UK spends about 30% more on the education of 6-15 year-olds (from public and private sources combined) than the average across the 35 developed OECD countries. The 2015 Programme of International Student Assessment (PISA) also shows that British students outperform their peers in science proficiency while gender gap trends common in other countries are less pronounced in the UK.

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Every week, we pick out one of the week's most interesting stories or comment pieces….which does not mean we agree with everything it says:

Brexit could draw more criminals to the UK, says police chief by Helen Pidd in the Guardian

UK records one of the lowest shares of smokers in the EU

The UK is one of the EU countries with the lowest share of smokers among its population aged 15 and over – 17.2%. This puts it in second place, after Sweden with 16.7% (data is available for all EU countries except Ireland). At the opposite end of the scale, about 1 in 3 persons aged 15 or over was a smoker in Bulgaria (34.7%) and Greece (32.6%). The figures are a snapshot of the situation in 2014 and were released on 7 December by Eurostat, the EU's statistical office.

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"I don't know what a hard or a soft Brexit are. I can say what a Brexit is: clear, ordered and with a clear agreement," Michel Barnier Chief negotiator for the Article 50 negotiations with the UK

The European summit on digital innovation for active and healthy ageing looks at how digital technology will transform the way we deliver health and care in Europe. It took place from 6 to 8 December. Robots – among which this one pictured – apps and wearables from the EU were displayed at the summit showing their solutions for active & healthy ageing.