European Citizenship: More Than Just the Right To Travel

This year, the European Union celebrates the 20th anniversary of the creation of European citizenship. This is one of the main reasons why the year 2013 was selected as a European Year of Citizens.

The goal of the European Year of Citizens is to raise awareness among general public about its rights and also to increase participation in the next European Parliament ́s elections taking place in mid-2014. Free movement is one of the four main freedoms of EU citizens through the level of migration of workers in Europe is very low. Insufficient awareness of workers’ rights, complicated recognition of professional qualifications, limited access to job vacancies in public sector, discrimination of cross border workers and, of course, the language barrier can be the reasons for low mobility. EURES and SOLVIT are two tools that can help to change this situation. EURES offers easy access to information about jobs in different member states and currently, over 1 million job vacancies are available in this network. SOLVIT offers free out-of-court settlement of disputes related to the EU internal market. SOLVIT deals with approximately 1,300 cases annually and its success rate is about 90%. Besides the right of free movement, European citizens also have the right to vote and to be elected as well as the right to receive consular assistance from another Member state embassy in the place of their stay, where their home state is not represented.

A new instrument to enforce the rights of EU citizens is the European Citizens ́ Initiative, which allows 1 million EU citizens from at least 7 member states to suggest to the Commission new legislative proposal focused on a specific area. These are conclusions of CEBRE debate that took place on 8th January 2013 in the European House in Prague.