Viviane Reding, a candidate for a post of EU Commissioner for Justice, Fundamental Rights & Citizenship gives encouraging answers
Today, the European Parliament questioned Viviane Reding, the Luxembourgish candidate for a post of EU Commissioner for Justice, Fundamental Rights & Citizenship. This is the first time such an EU Commissioner post is being instituted and ILGA-Europe followed with great interest and scrutiny the interview of Viviane Reding by the European Parliament.
If confirmed in this post, Viviane Reding will be in charge of a portfolio which will cover some of ILGA-Europe’s main priorities: fundamental rights, recognition of LGBT families and violence and hate crime, amongst others.
ILGA-Europe is satisfied with the answers provided by Viviane Reding during the 3 hours questioning by the members of the European Parliament and believes there is a room for productive cooperation and advancing the right of LGBT people and LGBT families at EU level.
Answering a question on violence and hatred against LGBT people Viviane Reding said “homophobia does not have place in Europe”.
Significantly, she said that families, including same-sex families, which obtain certain rights and protection in one EU Member State, cannot lose those rights when moving to another EU Member State. She made a commitment to initiate infringement procedures against those EU Member States who continue to fail proper implementation of the EU directive on freedom of movement. She also identified there will be further EU legislation introduced within the next 5 years to strengthen freedom of movement within the EU.
Viviane Reding highlighted the important of the Lisbon Treaty/The EU Charter of Fundamental Rights which came into force last December. The EU Charter of Fundamental Rights is the first and only international treaty explicitly banning discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation, and she will initiate an annual review of the implementation of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights.
Evelyne Paradis, Executive Director of ILGA-Europe’s said:
“We are encouraged by the answers of Viviane Reding on the issue of violence and hatred against LGBT community as it is one of the central issues we work on. We look forward to working with the Commissioner on initiating concrete actions to tackle these problems and to eliminate hatred and violence.
We are also encouraged by Viviane Reding’s answers regarding the mutual recognition of family legislation in the EU. LGBT families are recognised in many EU countries but still face serious obstacles when exercising their right to freedom of movement in the EU. We are glad to hear the Commissioner-designate is taking this issue seriously and hope that during the next 5 years we can expect significant improvement of the mutual recognition of LGBT families in the EU.”
