After the excitement of the European elections, the 720 newly elected Members of the 10th European Parliament took office on 16 July. Unfortunately, no members of the European Parliament are veterinarians.
The first meeting was dedicated to electing the most important offices. European Parliament President Roberta Metsola (you might remember her from the welcome video message she gave to FVE in Malta!) and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen were both re-elected. Next, committee members were appointed with Chairs and Vice-Chairs elected. In all, the diversity of the different parliamentary groups and gender distribution was balanced:
- For the EP Agri Committee: Veronika VRECIONOVÁ from the Czech Republic was elected Chair. She is part of the European Conservatives and Reformists Group (ECR). She said after her elections ‘I will work hard to improve conditions for family farmers and small and medium-sized farmers. We have to cut red tape massively and the whole Common Agricultural Policy has to reflect that we have started the accession dialogue with Ukraine. I will focus on animal welfare.”’ As co-chairs were elected: Daniel Buda (PPE) from Romania, Norbert Lins (PPE) from Germany and Eric Sargiacomo (S&D) from France.
- For the EP Envi Committee, Antonio Decaro from Italy was selected as Chair. He is part of the Alliance of Socialists and Democrats (S&D) and a new EP. He was the mayor of Bari and distinguished himself for his environmentalism and approach during the COVID-19 outbreak. Vice-Presidents: Esther Herranz Garcia (PPE) from Spain, Piotro Fiocchi (ECR) from Italy and Anja Hazekamp (Left) from the Netherlands.
In respect to the European Commission Commissioners, all member states need to forward names for their suggested Commissioner, which need to be approved by the European Parliament. Confirmation hearings for the different proposed Commissioners will start after the Summer, so we will only know by November this year who are the different Commissioners for the different Directorate Generals as DG Sante and DG Agri (with changes in DG’s possible).
FVE will continue to advocate for the manifesto of the EU vets continuously.
