Joint submissions of ILPA ns CM An Area of Freedom, Security and Justice Five Years On – Immigration and Asylum for the Next Five Years

A new programme for the next five-year period of an area of freedom, security and justice is in preparation. This has now been incorporated into a Communication from the Commission dates 18 May 2004, which according to the Note from the Presidency to the Permanent Representatives Committee of 12 May 2004 (Council Document 9415/04) that at its meeting in June the European Council, “is expected, on the basis of a Communication from the Commission, to initiate the process for the further development of policies in the area of justice and home affairs, building on the achievements of the Tampere programme.” Unless greater care is taken in this task, the challenges and mistakes of the first five-year period are likely to be repeated and exacerbated. The legitimacy of the European Union is being placed in question as a result of sloppy law making in one field of particular sensitivity. In order to avoid the errors of the first period, dialogue with civil society and non-governmental organizations should be welcomed. In this context two lists of measures are presented here: the first sets out the new measures which need to be adopted in the second five year period of the area of freedom, security and justice; the second list sets out those measures which need correction and change resulting from legislative mistakes which have been made in the first five years.