Follow Kacper, Elsa, Gisèle and Michalakis as they take part in the first EU exercise in direct democracy.

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Inside the Conference on the Future of Europe

https://api.multimedia.europarl.europa.eu/documents/20125/60751061/1659081716671_N01_AFPS_220721_CMND-EN.srt

I am actually a student in international economic relations.

I am 23 years old and I come from Poland.

We are four citizens from different nationalities

after months of discussions and powerful debates.

on the Conference on the Future of Europe.

It's the moment where we deliver our conclusions

We are the first people to do it,  so it has been very difficult.

because it is the result of many weeks' work.

We can't say it's over, but it is a big step.

Citizens from all 27 member states were randomly selected.

It's an innovation, because besides these citizen panels,

there is a digital platform. So everyone can participate.

in order to then become  recommendations for politicians:

When travelling through Europe I feel more European.

I like travelling a lot because I discover new cultures,

new ways of seeing the world.  Also, the people are very interesting.

I was very happy. I then explained it to my parents

but in the end, I came and I'm glad I did.

arriving from a small country like Belgium

and meeting people from all the other European countries.

So, very quickly the Belgian dimension became a European dimension.

Of course I knew that I would keep my DNA and my Belgian identity,

but I instantly felt part of the group with all the others.

I had a proposal to join the working group

And I thought: it's a brilliant opportunity

because I could tell them about young people's perspectives

My dream for Europe concerns our children and grandchildren,

I believe they will have a better future,

without war and conflict between countries

I focused on anti-discrimination and security.

For me, the question of quality of life was important.

it should rather be a good balance  between personal life and work.

In the first session, the citizens bring up fairly general things.

In the second session, they re-examine these main ideas and refine them

The third session consists of drafting orientations,

making recommendations that are much more concrete

and more likely to speak to decision-makers.

there were times when it was  very difficult for us to agree

But I think we've done an amazing job in our group.

We will have five orientations from our group.

The job of a facilitator as a neutral person

is to bring the citizens through this process.

where they start from a very broad vision for the EU

It works with the help of the translators

There's actually a pretty immediate translation, at most a few seconds' delay.

The floor is now to Mr. Kacper Parol, who is the spokesperson

of the citizens in the working group 'Economy'.

We had a lot of feedback for our proposals.

Some of the politicians didn't really agree

with some of the issues citizens mentioned.

Because they are learning too, about the Conference and the process.

So once they learned about the process, they were more appreciative.

Our panel 4 recommends a complete review of all agreements

and laws related to asylum and migration in Europe.

We've only got three years left  to reverse the greenhouse gas emissions trend,

not forgetting the water shortages ahead of us.

At the beginning, it was a little difficult  with the politicians,