Presentations by Mr. Panagiotis Skourletis, Minister of Interior of Greece administrative reforms and the institutional enhancement of local governance and by Dr. Nejc Brezovar, Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Public Administration of the Republic of Slovenia on his country’s Strategy on Development of Local Self-Government gave rise to extensive exchanges on experiences in member states at the seventh meeting of the European Committee on Democracy and Governance on 11 and 12 May 2017 in Strasbourg.
Ethics in public life and practical ways to strengthen this was underlined in contributions by:
- Mr Gianluca Esposito, Executive Secretary of the Group of States against Corruption (GRECO);
- Mr Ibon Uribe Elorrieta, Board member of EUDEL (Association of Basque municipalities), Mayor of Galdakao, Spain;
- Mr Tim Lisney, Secretary of the Congress’ Governance Committee;
- Mr Patrick Von Maravic, Chair of the Advisory group on revising the European Code of Conduct of the Congress;
- Mr Cezary Trutkowski, Council of Europe expert.
These presentations were followed by a lively debate on issues including preventative measures and risk analysis, institutional risk awareness, training and assistance to protect people at an individual level, transparency and confidentiality concerns as well as education on public ethics.
The CDDG also finalised the draft guidelines for civil participation in political decision-making. These will now be transmitted for consideration by the Committee of Ministers. It also agreed on further action to be taken with a view to strengthening the promotion of the Twelve Principles of Good Governance.
The CDDG further agreed on the steps to give follow-up to the findings and recommendations in the Secretary General’s reports, in particular in relation to good governance and public ethics, and questions addressed in his 2017 report on the “State of Democracy, Human Rights and the Rule of Law: Populism – How strong are Europe’s checks and balances?”.
