Thematic Subsidiarity Workshops (TSW) are regularly organised. They involve network partners as well as selected working groups. The topics discussed relate to the priorities of the EU legislative agenda
As such the workshops are an excellent tool to both communicate the concept of subsidiarity and to improve the visibility of the Subsidiarity Monitoring Network. As they involve multiple partners, they also add to the understanding the principle of subsidiarity.
The purpose of the TSW is to direct the subsidiarity debate towards practical issues in policy making within specific sectors, i.e. policy domains where decisions are mostly made at the local, regional or national levels. The TSW encourage a dialogue between the relevant players (EU Institutions, local and regional authorities represented in the CoR Subsidiarity Monitoring Network, think tanks, etc;) focusing on one or more EU initiatives.
Traditionally, the main workshop is held during the Open Days of the Committee of the Regions. The workshop is a good forum to discuss the outputs of the various initiatives, exchange of best practices and to analyse how the application of the subsidiarity principle can lead towards successful projects within different policy fields.
2014
The aim of the workshop was to highlight the importance of impact assessments and, in particular, territorial impacts assessments along the whole EU legislative process and for all the actors involved, from the Commission, to the Parliament, the Council, the Members States and the CoR and regional parliaments. So it was explained by the moderator, Mr Beck, from Kehl Euroinstitut.
2013
This year's focus has been on territorial impact assessments as a tool for territorial cohesion and better law-making. The workshop was chaired by CoR Member and Subsidiarity Coordinator Michael Schneider (DE/EPP) and counted with the participation of Lord Graham Tope (UK/ALDE) CoR rapporteur on "Regulatory Fitness"; Lewis Dijkstra from European Commission's DG REGIO and directly involved in the drafting of the recently adopted "Territorial Impact Assessment Guidelines"; Elke Ballon and Alexia Maniaki from the European Parliament's Directorate for Impact Assessments; and Peter Mehlbye, Director of the Coordination Unit of the ESPON Programme
2012
As part of the Open Days 2012, the Subsidiarity monitoring network is organising a workshop on TEN-T policy. The workshop will take place on 10 October from 11:15 to 13:00 at the premises of the Committee of the Regions in Brussels.
The Committee of the Regions has followed the development of TEN-T in two different ways. First, two CoR opinions focusing on the TEN-T Guidelines and on the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) have been adopted. Second, a consultation of the Subsidiarity Network was carried out; and finally, this year's Action Plan of the Network has analyzed the new TEN-T policy from a subsidiarity and multilevel governance point of view.
2011
The 2011 TSW held at the Open Days focused this year on the integration of immigrants at local and regional level. The event was attended by around 130 representatives from local and regional authorities and their associations, NGOs and the European institutions. Chaired by Mr Ramón Luis Valcárcel Siso, First Vice-President of the Committee of the Regions (CoR) and Coordinator of the Subsidiarity Monitoring Network (SMN), the panel included representatives from the European Parliament and the European Commission, as well as local and regional authorities. This year's Open Days workshop was co-organised with the CIVEX commission of the CoR.
2010
In 2010, another TSW was held at the Open Days. This workshop focused on social cohesion. In the framework of the Action Plan of the Subsidiarity Monitoring Network, two working groups examined issues related to social cohesion: the first one, led by the Basque Country focuses on "social innovation"; and the second one, led by ArcoLatino, "the fight against poverty and social exclusion". This workshop provided an excellent opportunity to put forward some of the results of the two working groups and to analyse how the application of the subsidiarity principle can lead to successful projects.
2009
