National Youth Council officials at EU Youth Ministers' Meeting in Ireland

Young people and youth NGO representatives joined EU ministers and senior officials responsible for Youth at a conference held in Dromoland Castle, Clare, Ireland, between March 4 and 6.

The meeting was organised by the Irish Presidency of the Council of the EU and, partly in view of the upcoming European Parliament elections, focused on the theme "Young People and Politics".

Irish Minister for Youth Affairs Ms Sile de Valera hosted and chaired the event. KNZ president Jean-Paul De Lucca and deputy international secretary Cory Greenland were among the young people participating in the two-day meeting.

Among those addressing the meeting were Joao Vale de Almeida, Director for Youth, Civil Society and Communication of the European Commission; Giacomo Filibeck, president of the European Youth Forum, and M. Michel Rocard, MEP, former Prime Minister of France and current chairman of the European Parliament Committee on Culture, Youth, Education, the Media and Sport.

Mr De Lucca addressed the plenary session of the meeting as the rapporteur of one of the three conference working groups. He stressed that politics is about being an active citizen and therefore the focus should not be limited to conventional politics.

"Participation of young people in politics should be restrictively understood in terms of party politics but as political engagement in a wider context," he said.

Mr De Lucca's report also highlighted the need for education in active citizenship in schools and curricula as well as a greater commitment towards instilling participation at the local community level. In the local context, for instance, KNZ will soon embark on a pilot project with a number of local councils. Concluding his address, Mr De Lucca stressed young people's involvement in the present and not merely as the passive future generation.

Mr Greenland said that we must fight the often negative and stereotypical portrayal of young people among organisations and in the media. Young people are frequently treated as second class decision makers and are held back by the older generations simply due to the fact that they are young. He explained that young people, together with older people, especially those previously involved in youth movements, could join forces in order to try and change this attitude and improve the involvement of young people in politics and civil society.

Welcoming Mr Greenland's comments, Mr Vale de Almeida said that there was surely a lot the Commission and other entities could do to improve this situation.

Mr De Lucca also said that to reach the aim of increasing youth participation in society, one had to ensure that this engagement of young people leads to concrete results. Otherwise, he said, this would increase the overall disenchantment of young people and undermine all other initiatives.

At the end of the conference, Minister de Valera agreed wholeheartedly with the KNZ president's comments and said that this observation will surely be included and addressed in the conclusions of the meeting.

The Ireland meeting was also an occasion for the European Commission to hold a final round of discussions and consultations on the priorities of the common objectives in the field of European Youth Policy identified by the Commission's White Paper entitled "A New Impetus for Youth".

The discussions focused mainly on youth voluntary activity and a better understanding of youth through research. The two KNZ officials actively participated in these discussions.

The Maltese delegation in Ireland also included Adrian Tonna, head of the Youth Section within the Ministry for Youth and the Arts, and Denis Buttigieg from ZAK.