Drivers & Active NeTwork for European Citizenship in Vocational Education and Training PROG. N° RO1-LEO Roccalumera – Messina ( ITALY ) November 2013

“ I am EU citizen and what’s in it for me? “ Activity developed by Coop. Soc. “Citta Viva “– Italy International workshop

European Year of Citizens 2013

2013 was officially designated as the "European Year of Citizens" by a decision of the European Parliament and of the Council, published November 23, 2012 in the Official Journal of the European Union. The overall objective of the European Year of Citizens is to enhance awareness and understanding of the rights and responsibilities associated with citizenship of the Union, in order to allow citizens to fully exercise their rights. Every citizen of the Union has a number of rights set out in the EU Treaties, including the right to move and live freely in another Member State. EU citizens are often not aware of these rights and the European Year 2013 aims to inform and explain to the citizens how to benefit directly the rights of the Union European Year of Citizens 2013

20 years after the birth of EU citizenship Europeans are broadly aware of their rights, but do not always know what these entail, according to a new Eurobarometer survey published by the European Commission today. 81% of respondents to the survey know that they are EU citizens on top of their own nationality. European Citizenship: Awareness growing about EU-guaranteed rights but people want to know more

However, only 36% feel well informed about the rights that EU citizenship entails. Europeans are most familiar with their rights to free movement (88%) and to petition EU institutions (89%). Meanwhile two- thirds (67%) consider that free movement of people within the EU brings economic benefits to their country.

Citizenship of the European Union was introduced by the Maastricht Treaty, which was signed in 1992, and has been in force since European citizenship is supplementary to national citizenship and affords rights such as the right to vote in European elections, the right to free movement, settlement and employment across the EU, and the right to consular protection from other EU states' embassies when a person's country of citizenship does not maintain an embassy or consulate in the country they need protection in. European Year of Citizens 2013

EU citizenship, conferred automatically on any EU national, brings with it a number of important rights.

Historically, the main benefits of being a citizen of an EU state has been that of free movement. The free movement also applies to the citizens of European Economic Area states and Switzerland. However with the creation of EU citizenship, certain political rights came into being. The Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union provides for citizens to be "directly represented at Union level in the European Parliament", and "to participate in the democratic life of the Union" (Treaty on the European Union, Title II, Article 10). Specifically, the following rights are afforded;

Political rights Voting in European elections: a right to vote and stand in elections to the European Parliament, in any EU member state (Article 22) Voting in municipal elections: a right to vote and stand in local elections in an EU state other than their own, under the same conditions as the nationals of that state (Article 22) Accessing European government documents: a right to access to European Parliament, Council, and Commission documents (Article 15).

Petitioning Parliament and the Ombudsman: the right to petition the European Parliament and the right to apply to the European Ombudsman in order to bring to his attention any cases of poor administration by the EU institutions and bodies, with the exception of the legal bodies (Article 24) Linguistic rights: the right to apply to the EU institutions in one of the official languages and to receive a reply in that same language (Article 24).

Rights of free movement - Right to free movement and residence: a right of free movement and residence throughout the Union and the right to work in any position (including national civil services with the exception of those posts in the public sector that involve the exercise of powers conferred by public law and the safeguard of general interests of the State or local authorities (Article 21) for which however there is no one single definition);

Freedom from discrimination on nationality: a right not to be discriminated against on grounds of nationality within the scope of application of the Treaty (Article 18); Rights abroad Right to consular protection: a right to protection by the diplomatic or consular authorities of other Member States when in a non-EU Member State, if there are no diplomatic or consular authorities from the citizen's own state (Article 23): this is due to the fact that not all member states maintain embassies in every country in the world (16 countries have only one embassy from an EU state.

The European Court of Justice has remarked that, EU Citizenship is destined to be the fundamental status of nationals of the Member States The ECJ has held that this Article confers a directly effective right upon citizens to reside in another Member State

Free movement rights Article 21 Freedom to move and reside Article 21 (1) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union states that : Every citizen of the Union shall have the right to move and reside freely within the territory of the Member States, subject to the limitations and conditions laid down in this Treaty and by the measures adopted to give it effect.

Article 45 Freedom of movement to work Article 45 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union states that 1. Freedom of movement for workers shall be secured within the Union Such freedom of movement shall entail the abolition of any discrimination based on nationality between workers of the Member States as regards employment, remuneration and other conditions of work and employment.

EU citizens are entitled to other rights including: the right to contact and receive a response from any EU institution in one of the EU's official languages; the right to access European Parliament, European Commission and Council documents under certain conditions; and the right of equal access to the EU Civil Service. The Treaty also prohibits discrimination on the basis of nationality.

. The Citizens' Initiative The Lisbon Treaty introduced a new form of public participation for European citizens, the Citizens' Initiative. This allows one million citizens who are nationals of a significant number of EU countries to call directly on the European Commission to bring forward an initiative of interest to them within the framework of its powers.

The idea of ​​Europe Europe is a union of cultural, political, economic, religious, artistic and custom diversity. Over the centuries, its boundaries are been crossed by a myriad of movements, trends and aspirations of all kinds that have characterized the different identities and the individual homelands. Despite this, the idea of ​​ Europe as a common ground and feeling nourished, especially in the last two centuries, the political events.

Messina Conference In 1955 the foreign ministers from Italy, France, Germany and Benelux met in this Sicilian town for an intergovernmental conference to prepare what became the Treaty of Rome in Federalists have since used the phrase "a new Messina conference" to express the wish that a political Union in Europe should be reborn from scratch through a constitution. The Convention was realising this wish.

Messina Conference The Messina Conference was held from 1 to 3 June 1955 at the Italian city of Messina, Sicily. The conference of the foreign ministers of the six member states of the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) would lead to the creation of the European Economic Community in 1958.ItalianSicily The delegations of the six participating countries were headed by Johan Willem Beyen (Netherlands), Gaetano Martino (Italy), Joseph Bech (Luxembourg), Antoine Pinay (France), Walter Hallstein (Germany), and Paul - Henri Spaak (Belgium). Joseph Bech was chairman of the meeting.

The meeting was held at Messina (and partially in Taormina) at the request of Gaetano Martino, the Italian Foreign Minister Messina Conference , President of the European Parliament

The Treaty of Rome The Treaty of Rome, officially the Treaty establishing the European Economic Community (TEEC), is an international agreement that led to the founding of the European Economic Community (EEC) on 1 January It was signed on 25 March 1957 by Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and West Germany. The word Economic was deleted from the treaty's name by the Maastricht Treaty in 1993, and the treaty was repackaged as the Treaty on the functioning of the European Union on the entry into force of the Treaty of Lisbon in 2009.

European Citizenship It is configured as a "status" additional to national citizenship. In fact, the status of European citizen does not compress the status of citizen of a single state, but this adds to the ownership status of new legal situations, new rights and also some new duty. In addition, the European citizenship itself as a "status" closely linked to national citizenship, and even that depends on this, since the status of a European citizen is given only to those who have the nationality of a Member State.... “ ( Principle of non-discrimination on grounds of nationality and citizenship )

What’s in it for me? Be a European citizen means to me feel closer to other people living in other European countries. All of us share in Europe in fact a society increasingly similar, made ​​ by the same values ​​ of freedom, equality, equal rights, ample opportunity to study and work. Be a citizen of the united Europe also means being able to travel more freely to get even closer to the daily life, customs and traditions of other countries. The free movement promotes not only travel for tourism purposes, but also the commercial and cultural exchanges.

One more opportunity for us is given by the opportunity to study and work in another country, fostering mutual knowledge, interpersonal and intercultural relations.

Europe for Citizens Programme Call for proposals operating grants Europe for Citizens Programme ( ) 11/11/2013The call for proposals for Structural support for European public policy research organisations (think tanks) and for civil society organisations at European level has been published - COMM-C2/