Multi-annual programme for Justice and Home Affairs
Information on Multi-annual programme for Justice and Home Affairs
- The Stockholm Programme - An open and secure Europe serving and protecting Citizens
- The Hague Programme: strengthening freedom, security and justice in the European Union
- The Final Report of the Future Group: Freedom, Security, Privacy – European Home Affairs in an open world
The Stockholm Programme - An open and secure Europe serving and protecting Citizens
The Stockholm Programme - An open and secure Europe serving and protecting Citizens
The Stockholm Programme is a political, strategic document describing the focus of cooperation in the policy areas rescue services, police and customs cooperation, criminal and civil law cooperation, asylum, migration, visas and external border controls, etc. over five years (2010–2014). The Stockholm Programme is the third programme in this area. The first programme was adopted in 1999 in Tampere. The second programme, the Hague Programme, was adopted in 2004 and expired in December 2009.
According to the Stockholm Programme the priorities and future activities in the fields of the European Home Affairs should be focused mainly on the interests and needs of the European Citizens. The ambition is to create a more secure and more open Europe, where the rights of the individual are protected and cooperation focuses on measures that provide added value for individuals. This work programme also attaches great importance to how the EU should work to guarantee respect for fundamental freedoms and privacy, while guaranteeing security in Europe.
With the objective to consider opinions and suggestions to this document Germany proposed to create the Informal High Level Advisory Group on the Future of European Home Affairs Policy, known as Future Group, whom the Czech Republic also participated in.The work of the Future Group has been summed up in The Final Report of the Future Group: Freedom, Security, Privacy – European Home Affairs in an open word published in June 2008. Even though this report was not binding the European Commission and the EU Member States in preparing text of the multi-annual programme, it belongs to important sources of inspiration for debate on the Future of European Home Affairs Policy.
On the basis of the Stockholm Programme the European Commision prepared the Communication "Delivering an area of freedom, security and justice for Europe's citizens – Action Plan Implementing the Stockholm Programme" setting up the list of concrete provisions and time schedule. However the EU Member States criticized that some of the actions proposed by the Commission are not in line with the Stockholm Programme and that others, being included in the Stockholm Programme, are not reflected in the Communication of the Commission. Therefore in June 2010 the Council approved the Conclusions urging the Commission to take only those initiatives that are in full conformity with the Stockholm Programme.
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The Hague Programme: strengthening freedom, security and justice in the European Union
The Hague Programme: strengthening freedom, security and justice in the European Union
The Hague Programme was approved by the European Council in November 2004. As the multi-annual programme it follows the Conclusions from Tampere 1999 and establishes general and political goals in the area of Justice and Home Affairs for the period of 2005-2009.
The objective of the Hague Programme implemented by its Action Plan is to improve the common capability of the European Union and its Member States to guarantee fundamental rights, minimum procedural protection and access to justice, to provide protection in accordance with the Geneva Convention on Refugees and other international treaties to persons in need, to manage migration flows and to control the external borders of the Union, to fight against the international organized crime and to repress the threat of terrorism, to fully use the potential of Europol and Eurojust, to promote further the mutual recognition of judicial decisions and certificates both in civil and in criminal matters, and to eliminate legal and judicial obstacles in litigation in civil and family matters with cross-border implication.
The objective of the Hague Programme implemented by its Action Plan is to improve the common capability of the European Union and its Member States to guarantee fundamental rights, minimum procedural protection and access to justice, to provide protection in accordance with the Geneva Convention on Refugees and other international treaties to persons in need, to manage migration flows and to control the external borders of the Union, to fight against the international organized crime and to repress the threat of terrorism, to fully use the potential of Europol and Eurojust, to promote further the mutual recognition of judicial decisions and certificates both in civil and in criminal matters, and to eliminate legal and judicial obstacles in litigation in civil and family matters with cross-border implication.
Documents:
- The Hague Programme (pdf, 189 kB)
- Action Plan implementing the Hague Programme (pdf, 211 kB)
The Final Report of the Future Group: Freedom, Security, Privacy – European Home Affairs in an open world
The Final Report of the Future Group: Freedom, Security, Privacy – European Home Affairs in an open world
The report approved by the JHA Council in July 2008 was created by the Informal High Level Advisory Group on the Future of European Home Affairs Policy („Future Group“) represented by the Ministers of the Interior of the three following Trio-Presidencies (Germany, Portugal, Slovenia; France, Czech Republic, Sweden; Spain, Belgium and Hungary), a common law observer (United Kingdom), representatives of the European Commission, the European Parliament and the General Secretariat of the Council.
This report was an inspiration for a new multi-annual programme in the area of Justice and Home Affairs for the period of 2010-2014, known as the Stockholm Programme that reflects contemporary and expected future problems in the area of freedom, security and justiceand the 2004 and 2007 European Union enlargements.
The Czech Republic participated on the preparations of the chapter covering migration issue.
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