LETTER FROM THE PORTUGUESE YOUTH CONVENTION MEMBERS

Dear Colleagues from the European Youth Convention:

The Portuguese Delegation to the Youth Convention congratulates itself for the fact that our contribution has not ended on July 12th and that many delegates have united themselves to dynamise and enlarge the debate at the national level.

In fact, we share the same concerns os several of the other delegates who allready voiced their opinions regarding the possibility of the EYC being a one off event.

Even tough we agree that pressure must be exerted so that the EYC can be repeated, our opinion is that this can only make sense if we have our homework properly done. Thus, we believe that the best way to exert this pressure is to develop and foster the debate about the future of Europe at the national level, with the youth.

As members of the EYC, this is one of our major tasks and responsabilities.

This way, if all of us are capable of doing something back home as far as the debate with the national youth is concerned, a second EYC would not only a good idea, but an inevitable one, because it would function as a follow-up mechanism of what has been done on a national basis. We would then be able to share experiences and views and to produce a solid and legitimate contribute to the works of the senior convention, from the european youths' point of view.

In Portugal, we have decided to launch a Portuguese Youth Convention in order to enrich and spread the debate started in Brussels. This Convention will take place on November 28th-29th 2002, in the Portuguese Parliament and will have the support of the Portuguese Parliament, the Regional Governments of the Azores and Madeira, the Secretary of State for European Affairs, the Secretary of State for Youth and Sports, the Lisbon Office of the European Parliament, the Representation of the European Commission, the Portuguese Youth Institute and the European Information Centre Jacques Delors. The works will be open by the President of the Portuguese Parliament and the Portuguese members of the Senior Convention will be present at the end for a debate on the final text with the 63 young participants (3 from every region of the continent, 3 from the Azores, 3 from Madeira and 3 Portuguese descendants living outside Portugal).

We've been working on this project since we came back from Brussels, in July.

You can have access to all information on this Portuguese Youth Convention on our website: http://www.parlamento.pt/convjovens (some of the information is available in English and French).

In order to publicise our initiative and to call for applications, we have travelled to every region in the country to make small presentations about the Convention and the Future of Europe to young people.

Moreover, we have participated in a debate with the Presidents of Portugal and Hungary, in which two of us presented a short paper about our experience and future actions.

The Portuguese Secretary of State for European Affairs is also organizing a series of Seminars regarding the future of Europe, throughout Universities all over the country. In each of this seminars, the portuguese members of the YEC are appointed as speakers, in order to share our thoughts and views. The first happened last Monday, in Lisbon, with the participation of the European Ombusdman, Mr. Jacob Soderman.

As you can see, the acquis we brought from Brussels is being materialized to a genuin will and enthusiam to debate Europe.

We are looking forward to hear from you,

Best regards from Portugal,

The Portuguese Delegation to European Youth Convention
Bruno Alexandre Dias Pinheiro
+ 351 96 28 98 260
BrunoDiasPinheiro@hotmail.com