1st Meeting of the EU Sports Ministers in Stuttgart
Within the context of the German Presidency of the European Council, the Ministers competent for sport convened in Stuttgart from 12 to 13 March for an informal meeting. The meeting was chaired by Wolfgang Schäuble, Federal Ministry of the Interior. Delegates and ministers from 26 EU Member States took part in this conference, as did Ján Figel, the EU Commissioner competent for sport. The items on the agenda included subjects such as Sport and Economics, Sport and Violence, Integration and Sport, Combating Doping and the Commissions White Paper on Sport. Thus, the conference followed up the preliminary work by the meeting of EU sports directors held in February (see monthly report for February 2007).
The focus of the subject area Integration and Sport was the socially integrative potential of sports clubs, in particular training measures and certification systems in the field of integration and the sustainability of integration measures.
In the field of Combating Doping, the Federal Ministry of the Interior selected greater homogeneity within the EU and coordinated cooperation of National Anti-Doping Organisations as goals of the Council Presidency.
The subject area Sport and Economics” dealt with the economic impact of major sports events such as the Football World Cup and the Olympic Games. It was also agreed that a European satellite account could better collect relevant data on the economic effects of sport, its dynamism and above all its employment effects.
2nd European Parliament: Professional football and security at soccer games
The European Parliament (EP) dealt with two issues relating to sport at its plenary session from 28 – 29 March:
1. Report on the future of professional football in Europe
2. Security at soccer matches
The report on the future of professional football in Europe deals with issues such as legal security, financial transparency and good governance in clubs, as well as comparable conditions of competition at national and European level. In order to reduce the legal insecurity of sport and to prevent the future of sport being primarily determined by legal rulings, the EP proposes intensifying the dialogue between politics and sport.
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-//EP//TEXT+REPORT+A6-2007-0036+0+DOC+XML+V0//EN
At Austrias initiative, the Council submitted a decision on the subject of Security at soccer matches of international significance which is intended to make the work of the football information points more efficient and more professional.
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-//EP//TEXT+REPORT+A6-2007-0052+0+DOC+XML+V0//EN
