Mr. Csaba Borboly submitted again amendments to the Committee of the Regions

A „No” from European People's Party regarding the endeavour of national minorities

On 16^th of September, out of 5 amendments 3 were successfully submitted by Mr. Csaba Borboly, the president of Harghita County Council and member of the CoR. These amendments were accepted by the EDUC Commission for Education, Youth, Culture and Research of the Committee of the Regions.

Mr. Csaba Borboly is member of the EDUC Commission and his amendments are related to the Draft Opinion entitled Disability, Sport and Leisure. Regarding the 10^th point, the Committee of the Regions agreed with the proposal emphasizing the role of local governments in developing the sport of people with disadvantages; with fostering the sport infrastructure and sport activities as well as from the perspective of long term investments in the concerned field. This proposal was complemented by Mr. Csaba Borboly by highlighting the issue of assuring project funding possibilities for those regions, where school and other educational institutions’ infrastructure is underdeveloped. Thereupon the students with disabilities do not have possibility to do sport. At the 17^th paragraph of the document Mr. Csaba Borboly emphasises the following: it is important to have informative campaigns addressed not merely to people with disabilities but also to the large public in order to enhance the social integration of people with disadvantages. All the more since the aim is to facilitate the large public’s positive opinion on these people, on understanding, accepting and integrating them as they are, respectively to learn how we can offer help for them. The 19^th paragraph dealing with organizing forums for the recruitment and training of volunteers, as well as with their recognition and award, is supplemented by Mr. Csaba Borboly by adding that an attention has to be called for the importance of volunteer activities.

As far as the rejected proposals are concerned, both of them are related to national minorities. The 20^th point of the Draft Opinion draws the attention on the fact that some part of the population has to face double or triple discriminative challenges. Namely, those persons who are living with multiple disabilities; are immigrants or are the victims of homophobia or social exclusion related to genre. This enumeration was complemented by Mr. Csaba Borboly with also adding people belonging to minorities. On the basis of the county council president’s proposal related to the 31^st point, the Committee of the Regions recognizes that it is essential to assure mentally disabled people’s native language education, who are members of minorities, since it is highly difficult to integrate these people by using a different language that is already quite hard for them to learn due to their disabilities.

Mr. Csaba Borboly declared that ‘each member of the European People’s Party was outvoting my proposal concerning national minorities, and this was not the first case during my mandate. I will request the president of DAHR (Democratic Alliance of Hungarians in Romania) to discuss this with our own political group, since if the suggestions referring to protection of minorities receive this much rejection, long-termly speaking the Hungarian community in Romania will not have the possibility to use multiple opportunities, since those proposals would exist in the European law as providing us favourable and opportunity assuring frames. ’

Nevertheless, owned to the county council president’s proposal, the EDUC Commission will hold its first meeting next year discussing the topic of youth’s labour market integration with the title of Youth’s Europe 2014-2020. Originally the county council president has called the attention of EDUC Commission to organize an external meeting in Harghita County on the topic of professional training of youth. This proposal being the departure point, the EDUC Commission plans to organize its first meeting in Krakow next year requesting Mr. Csaba Borboly to participate as rapporteur.

New rapporteur in the field of European higher education

Mr. Csaba Borboly offered to play an active role in the theme of „In the world of the European higher education” and his request has been accepted by the EDUC Commission. The county council president argued his choice on the ground that Harghita County Council is partner in several EU-funded projects linked to this topic; for example he mentioned the SEEMIG project dealing with the elaboration of strategies related to migration. The partners of this project are also tackling with the migration of qualified labour force, whose visions may contribute to the elaboration of the proposals. Another example is the internship programme of Harghita County Council, which enjoys great popularity in the circle of university students. Based on this programme is planned to launch the specialist training programme also.

Miercurea Ciuc, 16^th of September 2013.