On the last day of its 46th Congress session on 28 March 2024, the Congress adopted a recommendation containing its contribution to the UN Summit of the Future. This summit will take place in New York on 22 and 23 September 2024 and will bring together Heads of State and Government from around the world to discuss concrete steps on how to respond to emerging global challenges. The result of the summit will be a political declaration named Pact for the Future.

As a political assembly of local and regional authorities of 46 member States of the Council of Europe, the Congress is convinced that the current and future global challenges can only be addressed by harnessing the power of local and regional governments as the level closest to citizens.  In its recommendation, the Congress called on the Council of Europe member States to support the role of local and regional authorities in delivering the global agenda for sustainable development, including the Pact for the Future.

“Our experience at the Congress shows that institutionalizing the voice of local and regional authorities is an important step towards a meaningful multilevel governance, it leads to a stronger and more effective policy making,” stated Gunn-Marit Helgesen (Norway, R, EPP/CCE), Congress rapporteur on the UN Summit of the Future.

Deputy Mayor of Paris Arnaud Ngatcha informed members about the work of the UN Secretary General’s Advisory Group on Local and Regional Governments which includes Mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo. He highlighted the importance of adopting a multilevel governance approach to achieving the Agenda 2030. Mr Ngatcha also underlined the important role cities play in combatting climate change, and welcomed the fact that local governments were granted access to the state talks at COP 28.

“The involvement of local and regional authorities in this process can create a strong enabling environment for the successful implementation of Agenda 2030”, concluded Gunn-Marit Helgesen.