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2013 will be the European Year of Citizens

The better the men and women of Europe understand their rights as EU citizens, the more informed the decisions they can take in their personal lives, and the more vibrant democratic life in Europe can be at all levels.

This is the vision for the European Year of Citizens 2013, which will provide an opportunity for people throughout Europe to:

learn about the rights and opportunities open to them thanks to EU citizenship – particularly their right to live and work anywhere in the EU
stimulate debate about the obstacles that prevent people from fully using these rights and generate specific proposals for addressing them
encourage people to participate in civic fora on EU policies and issues.

The Year's activities will be organised as much as possible at the grass-roots level, by citizens and civil society organisations themselves.

Activities organised by the European Commission:

a centrally managed communication campaign with a multilingual website, communication toolbox, press kit and promotional material.
opening & closing conferences for the Year and thematic conferences
participation in national, regional and local events across the EU.

An official website of the Year will be available soon.

http://ec.europa.eu/citizenship/european-year-of-citizens-2013/index_en.htm

The European Parliament

This is your assembly, the only directly-elected European Union institution.

Founded in 1952 as the Common Assembly of the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) and renamed the European Parliamentary Assembly in 1958, it became the European Parliament in 1962. The first direct elections took place in 1979. The current MEPs were elected during the 2009 elections and will serve until 2014.

The evolution of the Parliament is closely linked to a succession of treaties culminating in the current Lisbon Treaty. These treaties define the rules and scope of the Union and have turned the ECSC of old into what is now known as the European Union.

The European Parliament has been steadily gaining power over recent decades and now acts as a co-legislator for nearly all EU law. Together with the Council, the Parliament adopts or amends proposals from the Commission. Parliament also supervises the work of the Commission and adopts the European Union's budget. See how it all works here.

Beyond these official powers the Parliament also works closely with national parliaments of EU countries. Regular joint parliamentary assemblies allow for a better inclusion of national perspectives into the Parliament's deliberations.

The European Parliament is the only directly-elected EU body and one of the largest democratic assemblies in the world. Its 754 Members are there to represent the EU's 500 million citizens. They are elected once every five years by voters from across the 27 Member States.

Do you want to know how the Parliament is organised? Once elected, Members organise along political lines. They form political groups to better defend their positions. Currently there are seven groups.

Most of Parliament's in-depth work is done in specialised committees that prepare reports that will later be voted on in the plenary.

The Parliament's rules of procedure provide a detailed framework for the Parliament at work. Being a representative of all European citizens, the assembly's multilingualism has become one of its most important aspects. Parliamentary documents are published in all the official languages of the EU and every MEP has the right to speak in the official language of their choice.

http://www.europarl.europa.eu/aboutparliament/en/00b3f21266/At-your-service.html