Public consultation on the Commission's Stakeholder Consultation guidelines

Stakeholder consultation helps to make EU law making transparent, well targeted and coherent. It is enshrined in the Treaties. Consultations - together with impact assessments, evaluations and expertise - are a key tool for transparent and informed policy making. They help taking decisions that respect principles of proportionality and subsidiarity and that are based on evidence, experiences and views of those affected by the policies and involved in their implementation. The Commission consults widely, at each stage of the policy cycle, respecting principles of openness and transparency and following minimum standards, which are generally acknowledged as appropriate and respond to international best practice. Over the last five years, stakeholders' views were sought through more than 500 open consultations published on the ‘Your Voice in Europe’ website.

The guidelines focus on consultations carried out in policy preparation (of new policies, (spending) programmes, legislative proposals, delegated and implementing acts – with or without impact assessment). They also apply to consultations in the context of evaluations. They provide advice and support on all aspects of carrying out consultations from the definition of the consultation's objectives to the evaluation of the consultation exercise.

While these guidelines are intended for internal Commission use only, stakeholder inputs are an essential element in ensuring the quality of the final product. The Commission therefore encourages stakeholders to participate in this consultation.

Policy fields

Institutional affairs

Period of consultation

From 30/06/2014 to 30/09/2014

Consultation document and questionnaire

The questionnaire can be accessed here.(all languages will be available soon)

The accompanying consultation document can be accessed here(324 kB) .

How to submit your contribution

Your contribution should be sent either:

online, by filling in the online form here.
by email to the functional mailbox indicated in the section "Contact details";
to the postal address indicated in the same section;

You may reply in any of the 24 official EU languages. The reply may be published in the language of submission. Replies from organisations not registered in the Transparency Register will be published separately. You may register here.

Contributions will be published on this webpage. Submissions that are clearly marked as "anonymous" will be treated as such and published without personal information.

Submissions indicated as "not for publication" will be treated as such and will not be published. Please read the privacy statement attached to this consultation for information on how your personal data and contribution will be dealt with.

Contact details

Responsible service: European Commission, Secretariat-General, Unit SG C4 – "Work Programme and Stakeholder Consultation"

Functional mailbox: SG-STAKEHOLDER-GUIDELINES-CONSULTATION@EC.EUROPA.EU

Postal address:
European Commission
Secretariat-General – Unit SG C4 – "Work Programme and Stakeholder Consultation"
BERL 7/16
B-1049 Brussels
Belgium

View the contributions received

The contributions will be uploaded per category of respondents as they are received.

In the interest of transparency, organisations are invited to provide the public with relevant information about themselves by registering in the Transparency Register and subscribing to its Code of Conduct. If the organisation is not registered, the submission is published separately from the registered organisations.

Next steps

After closure of the public consultation, the Commission will analyse and process the replies received. Based on the outcome of the public consultation, the Commission will finalise its Stakeholder Consultation guidelines and make them public on the Europa website.