(4) Leading the digital transformation, particularly on data, technology and infrastructure. (3) Reinforcing the European Green Deal and raising its ambitions. President von der Leyen announced her support for qualified majority voting on foreign policy issues (to a thunderous standing ovation), but this is easier said than done. She affirmed that the EU is ready to build a new transatlantic agenda with the United States and to reach a deal with the UK, provided it honours the Withdrawal Agreement, ‘a matter of law, trust and good faith’ on which the EU ‘will never backtrack’. Implicit in von der Leyen’s speech was that the strength of the EU lies in the sum of its parts, but only if these are working together towards the same ends. COVID-19 has demonstrated the extent to which functioning economies and societies depend on the stability and prosperity of the interconnected world. The President called for lessons to be learned, saying Europe must build a stronger European health union, with a future-proof and properly funded EU4Health programme, a reinforced European Medicines Agency (EMA) and a strengthened European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC). The EU-African Union (AU) Summit postponed to 2021 offers the European Commission an opportunity to rethink its approach and start connecting its external and internal action. In her State of the Union speech today, President von der Leyen further announced the Commission’s plans to present an European anti-racism action plan, to strengthen racial equality laws, and to extend the list of EU-level crimes to all forms of hate crime and hate speech, whether based on … Nevertheless, the EU has considerable oft-forgotten soft power strengths which it could use to positively influence the many global challenges that we face. The President further announced that 30% of the Next Generation EU budget will be raised through green bonds, and that 37%  of the funding will be invested in European Green Deal objectives, including ‘lighthouse’ European projects – hydrogen, green building and one million electric charging points. Ursula von der Leyen is expected to outline the impact of the Commission’s work in mitigating the COVID-19 sanitary and economic crisis, and to outline her vision for economic recovery, fighting climate change, and the situation in Europe’s neighbourhood. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen will hold her annual State of the Union address this morning. She also highlighted her intention to make the next 10 years Europe’s Digital Decade. As president of the European Commission, von der Leyen is head of the EU executive, while, as European Council president, Charles represents member state governments. This was a speech founded on European values and cohesion is a fundamental EU value. With rigorous economic research and practical policy solutions, we focus on the issues and institutions that are critical to global development. In this blog, we look at what’s missing from von der Leyen’s speech and outline what it should have said for her to fulfil her aspiration of a “geopolitical Commission.”. The President called for the revitalisation and reform of the multilateral system, including the UN, WTO and WHO. for 1+3, enter 4. A row has broken out after the snub at the Tuesday's summit where one of the topics was women's rights. Today, on 16 September 2020, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen gave her State of the Union Address at the Plenary of the European Parliament, presenting the Commission’s priorities for the upcoming months as well as announcing the main initiatives that it … European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen spread a message of unity and moving forward in her first State of the Union speech on Wednesday. Explore our core themes and topics to learn more about our work. With a wide-ranging set of actions, she proclaimed the Commission’s intent to seize the moment, use the money available, and increase its powers to help “build the world we want to live in.” However, while not short of ambition for Europe’s citizens, von der Leyen’s frequently espoused aspiration for the EU to become a leading global player was, to an extent, a whitewash. In 2019, she was elected as President of the European Commission. Solve this simple math problem and enter the result. Von der Leyen called for the strengthening of the European Medicine Agency and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), as well as for the creation of a new agency for biomedical advance research and development. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen was left without a seat, and had to sit on a nearby sofa, as the bloc's leaders met with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. You can watch the debate here. Ursula von der Leyen was left without a seat at a summit in Ankara on Tuesday after her two male counterparts took the only available chairs, leaving her to perch on a nearby sofa. On the international stage, von der Leyen explicitly renewed the EU's commitment to multilateralism. Also known as the tate f he uropean nion, it is the speech the President of the European Commission delivers before the European Parliament every September. This power not only provides opportunity but also bestows responsibility for it to be used to the benefit of all humanity. Ursula von der Leyen was Minister at federal level in Germany for more than 14 years and responsible for family, then labor and social affairs and later defence. And beyond Europe’s borders, she issued a plea for qualified majority voting on foreign policy—a long-standing stalemate issue for the Member States—and for Europe to take clear positions and quick actions including sanctions targeting individuals suspected of human rights abuses. Some of this investment is precautionary (health security “insurance”, or surge capacity), to mitigate the catastrophic risk of health systems being overrun by future pandemics, but the majority of the investment needed is simply to bring them up to minimal levels of operational effectiveness. On 16 th of September 2020, Commission President Ursula Von der Leyen gave her first State of the Union (SoU) address, a practice that began in 2010.The annual address is evidence of the growing presidentialisation of the Commission following the ratification of the Lisbon Treaty. Inspired by the State of the Union address delivered most years by the US president, the European counterpart attempts to render the EU more transparent as it sets the Commission President’s vision and legislative proposals for the year ahead. Ursula von der Leyen News – Why Germans understand the EU best. In timely and incisive analysis, our experts parse the latest development news and devise practical solutions to new and emerging challenges. Twenty percent of the EU’s Recovery Plan will be invested in digital projects, ranging from the creation of a European cloud securing personal data to the expansion of 5G and the development of supercomputers. The annual address is evidence of the growing presidentialisation of the Commission following the ratification of the Lisbon Treaty. She also announced a Global Health Summit to be organised with Italy in 2021. Undoubtedly, given the absence of a genuine common European foreign and security policy, there were always going to be limits to von der Leyen’s geopolitical Commission. With its scale, human-centred approach, and its longer financial planning frameworks, the EU is well placed to do this. Her speech offered little more than platitudes to the EU’s partner countries. In particular, President von der Leyen stressed the following goals as the priorities of the Commission for the upcoming months: (1) Protecting the health of citizens in Europe. Turning to migration, President von der Leyen announced that next week the Commission will put forward its New Pact on Migration, with an approach based on humanity, solidarity and ‘a clear distinction between those who have the right to stay and those who do not’. To take just one example of where cross-sectoral approaches are needed, accelerating digital work and learning opportunities requires not just massive investment in broadband infrastructure networks, but less visibly and more patiently, in related secondary general and technical education attainment. E.g. Putting cohesion back into the heart of the European Union. • Legislative proposal on revision of the EU emission trading system (ETS), • Legislative proposal on the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism, • Revision of the Renewable Energy Directive, the Energy Efficiency Directive and the Directive on Energy Performance of Buildings, • Revision of the Regulation on Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Removals from Land Use, Land Use Change and Forestry, • Legislative proposal to address methane emissions in the energy sector, revision of the regulatory framework for competitive decarbonised gas markets and revision of the Energy Taxation Directive, • Revision of the Directive on Intelligent Transport Systems and the Directive on Deployment of Alternative Fuels Infrastructure. Former President Jean-Claude Juncker committed to this in his 2018 State of the Union address, and it never got off the ground. The EU can play a central role in exporting innovations in city design, IT infrastructure, renewable energy use, and local entrepreneurship, alongside investment in social services. On 16th September 2020, European Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen, delivered her first State of the Union (SOTEU) speech, setting the tone for the rest of her five-year term. Brussels is stepping up to tackle the big crises, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen declared Wednesday in her first State of the European Union speech, and she pointedly challenged EU capitals and international powers to do the same. The President further called for a debate on new competences for the EU in the field of health, as part of the forthcoming Conference on the Future of Europe. It is, therefore, sustained support to Europe’s developing country partners which will be essential. CGD blog posts reflect the views of the authors, drawing on prior research and experience in their areas of expertise. Brigid Laffan (Director of the Robert Schuman Centre, EUI). Only two seats were set up for the meeting, which involved Ursula von der Leyen, President Erdogan, and EU Council President Charles Michel. There is no doubt that COVID-19 has brought a new reality to thinking about the financing of healthcare at a global level. In Germany, there is commotion about a new book, Ausbruch: Innenansichten einer Pandemie [Outbreak: Insights from Inside a Pandemic], in which two journalists describe meetings held during the corona crisis between federal chancellor Angela Merkel, and the 16 prime ministers of its federal constituent states. The debate will start with an address by President von der Leyen, followed by several rounds of interventions by political group speakers between which Ms von der Leyen will reply. Footage shows a perplexed Ms Von der Leyen as Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan and European Council president Charles Michel took … While von der Leyen did demonstrate strong commitment to the European neighbourhood—Western Balkans and the Eastern partner countries, and outspoken support for the people of Belarus—she failed to offer a compelling vision for Europe’s soft power, including global alliances and equal partnerships. The EU should increasingly follow the example set by the politically, technically, and economically attractive programmes it has already designed in the context of its own internal-interests programmes, which are surprisingly disconnected from its development cooperation, all too often treated as a separate silo. Little mention was given to these strengths, nor how the EU could capitalise on them to lead the way in global recovery. European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen was speechless after being left without a chair during a meeting with Turkey's leader.