The new European Parliament has the potential for creating a Europe that leaves no one behind, that fosters an inclusive and welcoming Europe, and that champions global solidarity.

As Caritas Europa we have started building relations with the elected MEPs, most recently through the launch event in the European Parliament of our European Common Home publication, which explores the current reality of migration and its effects on the development of both migrants’ receiving communities and their places of origin. Caritas Europa is committed to cooperate with the newly elected Parliament to ensure a constructive dialogue toward achieving our vision in the fields of social policy and social economy, asylum, migration and integration, international cooperation and development, and humanitarian action. These are the areas where Caritas Europa is the most active and in which the thousands of employees and volunteers of our member organisations across Europe work tirelessly to allow for progress towards social justice, always aiming at serving the most vulnerable and marginalised persons in our societies.

With a new European Commission shortly being established, and with a new President of the Council of Ministers being elected, we are at a beginning of some exciting years ahead with a lot of potential from a policy perspective. There are many tools at our disposal to advance at the European level towards achieving a more fair society and to promote the common good through the European construction, which is based on values of respect for human dignity, liberty and democracy. However, we also know that there are important challenges ahead. The European project is often questioned in today’s society and the common values are under threat. The first victims of this are the most marginalised and vulnerable persons. We are ready to take on our responsibility in addressing these challenges as much as we can from our perspective as Caritas. In the field of social policy, we will advocate for strong social welfare models with well-functioning inclusive labour markets able to create decent jobs for all, and strong solidarity systems based on agreed international standards. We are keen to contribute to the adoption and implementation of an action plan on the European Pillar of Social Rights, which supports and underpins the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals, and to explore and support its interlink with the new European Green Deal, since there can be no social justice without climate justice.

We look forward to working together with the newly elected European Parliament, Commission and Council of Ministers to allow for ambitious legislative frameworks in this field and in our other areas of priority for the years ahead. We count on the European Institutions to allow for a truly inclusive policy debate, where dialogue with civil society is at the core, in order to allow for policies that truly address the needs in our society and that lead to the Europe we strive for: a Europe that leaves no one behind.