Changes from report parliamentary committee draft to plenary report

1. Introduction

This report examines the implementation of the EU Youth Strategy 2019-2027 (EUYS), with a particular focus on the period 2022-2024, as outlined in the Commission Report on the implementation of the EU Youth Strategy (2022-2024) - COM(2025)0117 final - SWD(2025)0072 + 0073.

The European Parliament had not adopted an implementation report for the 2019-2021 period. Thus, the current report aims to assess implementation covering the entire duration of the EUYS, give recommendations for the last years of its implementation, and prepare the ground for the post-2027 framework.

The report focuses on the policy coherence of the EUYS and the extent to which youth has been mainstreamed across the Union’s various policies; and to take stock of youth inclusion and participation, as well as access to quality education and training for young people, volunteering and youth work.

2. Procedure and sources

Since her appointment on 7 April 2025, the Rapporteur has collected specific evidence from these sources, among others:

3. Implementation and policy coherence of the EUYS

The EUYS is the framework for EU youth policy cooperation for 2019-2027, based on the Council Resolution of 26 November 2018. The EUYS is built around the framework Engage, Connect, Empower and seeks to improve young people’s wellbeing by creating more and better opportunities in education, employment, civic participation, and inclusion. EU youth cooperation aims to make the most of youth policy’s potential and foster youth participation in democratic life; and aims to ensure that all young people have the necessary resources to take part in society.

The EUYS has had to adapt to major crises: the COVID-19 pandemic, the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine, and the subsequent rise in inflation and cost of living. These events, combined with pre-existing challenges such as youth unemployment, mental health concerns, environmental sustainability, and rural-urban disparities, have shaped the opportunities and constraints faced by the 73 million young EU citizens.

The EPRS evaluation concludes that at the EU-level, the EUYS and its instruments do not create significant additional burdens beyond their implementation costs, and that a dedicated youth policy coordination framework – a strategy with a clear vision and priorities - remains essential post-2027. The core EUYS areas (Engage, Connect, Empower) embody the essence of youth policy and remain relevant and foundational post-2027. In addition, it is essential to ensure inclusion in youth participation. Learning mobility, notably through Erasmus+ and volunteering exchanges, should continue to play a central role, alongside the recognition and support of youth workers, volunteering and non-formal learning, which are considered key to empowering young people.

European youth goals (EYGs)

The EUYS is guided by the 11 European Youth Goals (see infographic below), adopted following dialogues in 2017-2018 with young people across Europe. The EUYS should contribute to realising these cross-sectoral goals that affect young people’s lives and point out challenges.

https://youth-goals.eu/youthgoals

The EPRS evaluation identifies a lack of foresight in the development of the EYGs, as young people tended to focus on their concerns at the time of the consultations; it was difficult for them to anticipate what would become relevant to them in the future.

The 2019-2027 EYGs lacks adaptability to address a changing socio-economic and geopolitical context. New cross-cutting issues that have emerged since their adoption have not been sufficiently addressed neither in the EYGs nor the EUYS Work Plans. A solution would be that future consultations also include researchers, academics and stakeholders to offer a more foresight-oriented picture of topics that might become important in the future. A shortened EUYS cycle of 5 years could also help reflect rapid developments.

The final years of the EUYS should focus on managing the transition between current and emerging youth priorities. Key concerns to consider in the EYGs post-2027 include peace and security, defence, radicalisation, disinformation, affordable housing, digitalisation’s long-term impact and education, in order to counter disinformation, environmental disasters, physical and mental health. Stakeholders believe that safeguarding civic space and civil society, competitiveness, skills, democracy, EU citizenship and values should be further prioritised post-2027. The European Commission (EC) should integrate these emerging topics into the remaining implementation period to ensure the EUYS remains relevant and forward-looking.

The EPRS evaluation shows that implementation of the EYGs varies across the Union, due to their non-binding nature and differing national priorities. For example, mental health and wellbeing, rural youth opportunities, and youth employment remain unevenly addressed across Member States.

During EU Youth Dialogues, young people are consulted on selected topics linked to one or more EYGs. Nevertheless, it is the Council Trio Presidency that selects the EYGs to be addressed in the Dialogue based on national priorities of the respective Member States. Thus, while it is an achievement that the Trio Presidency works on the EYGs, some EYGs that are crucial to young people may never have the chance to be addressed in a Dialogue.

Furthermore, the EYGs’ implementation is not systematically monitored, which makes it difficult to evaluate if a EYG has been met. The EU Youth Indicator Dashboard to assess progress on the EUYS does currently not include the EYGs and they should be integrated.

EUYS Work Plans

The EUYS operates in 3-year work cycles. The priorities for each cycle are set by the Council together with the EC in EUYS Work Plans. The EPRS evaluation notes that the EUYS Work Plans are an important instrument to facilitate the implementation of the EYGs and provide a consolidated view of EU-level priorities; however, only a limited number and types of stakeholders are aware of them.

EU Youth Coordinator (EYC)

The EYC was established to enhance cross-sectoral cooperation and knowledge development, and to exchange on youth issues in the EC. According to the EPRS evaluation, the EC should evaluate the role of the EYC to further empower and strengthen its function as a central coordination mechanism. The need for a stronger, formal political mandate, a dedicated budget, and a reporting function should be assessed, and horizontal coordination and accountability enhanced. The EYC and their team should serve as a hub connecting youth-related EU initiatives, including EC sectoral initiatives and programmes, and support Member States in adopting similar coordination mechanisms at national/regional level.

4. Youth mainstreaming across the Union and policy areas

The EUYS has promoted the idea of youth mainstreaming, i.e. systematically integrating youth perspectives across all policies.

EYY2022 and its Legacy

Since the European Year of Youth 2022 (EYY2022), youth mainstreaming has advanced through new instruments implemented by the EC, such as the Youth Check, the internal EC Youth Correspondents network, and the external EU-Youth Stakeholders group, and Youth Policy Dialogues with Commissioners. These instruments aim to ensure that the potential impact of policies on young people is systematically assessed during the policymaking process.

In its communication COM/2024/1, the EC committed to running a Youth Check on its key policy proposals. The youth check supports the EUYS and consists of assessing EC initiative’s relevance for, and potential impact on, young people. The Youth Check is mandatory for key initiatives listed in Annex I of the EC’s Annual Work Programme (AWP).

The four key phases for the youth check, established in the Communication, are:

a. Assessment of youth relevance – the EC, with the support of its youth correspondents, and involving the Youth Network when needed, assesses if a planned initiative included in the priority initiatives set out in Annex I of the Commission work programme will have significant relevance for young people. A consistent process will be used to identify these key priority initiatives.

b. Youth consultations – when an initiative has been flagged as particularly relevant for youth, the EC will consider a dedicated youth consultation (targeted surveys, discussions with young people, representative youth organisations or the Youth Stakeholders’ platform). In addition, in such cases, a mandatory set of questions targeting youth will be included in the public consultations, with the possibility to identify the age group of respondents. This will help further stimulate youth contributions and outline them in impact assessments. The new national/regional youth coordinators (see further below) could be mobilised to facilitate consultations at national level.

c. Impact assessment – the Commission, with the support of youth correspondents, conducts the impact assessment, drawing on all Better Regulation tools considered as particularly relevant for youth and making sure that impacts on young people are properly analysed whenever they have been identified as being relevant.

d. Scrutiny – the Regulatory Scrutiny Board verifies whether all impacts have been properly analysed including the youth impacts and consultations whenever they have been flagged as particularly relevant for the initiative.

The last two steps apply only to legislative files.

In particular, the inclusion of youth in impact assessments (IAs) were the core of the call from youth organisations during the EYY2022, which the Parliament has supported in its resolution 2022/2953(RSP).

While the Better Regulation Toolbox does not include a specific section on the Youth Check, the toolbox provides other tools to ensure that the impact of policies and policy proposals, including on young people, is assessed. In view of the upcoming Communication on Better Regulation, the Youth Checks should be included as a specific instrument in the Toolbox.

Since the Youth Check was launched only in January 2025, there is limited evidence of its effectiveness and outcomes. According to the EC, since its launch, the Youth Check has already been applied to 12 initiatives from the 2025 AWP. Among the initiatives, the Commission selected all the 2028-2034 Multiannual Financial Framework proposals as ‘youth-relevant’, meaning they would be subject to a Youth Check in their impact assessment. However, according to internal analysis of the EC’s IAs accompanying the 2028-2034 MFF proposals, carried out by EPRS, it appears that several of them do not mention youth in their IAs, or they do not elaborate sufficiently on the potential impact of the initiative on young people. Currently, youth relevance is determined based on the list of initiatives in Annex I of the AWP. It would be essential to let young people decide which policies are relevant to them and which policies they would like to engage with, as it is done in the EESC youth test.

Youth mainstreaming in the EP

On 3 December 2024, the Coordinators of the Committee on Culture and Education (CULT) endorsed the renewal of the CULT Committee’s #Engaged4YOUth strategy and proposed actions for 2024-2029, among which are:

Youth Policy Dialogues with Commissioners

The College of Commissioners’ oral hearings and their replies to written questions demonstrate the Commissioners’ commitment to embed youth mainstreaming as a horizontal principle of EU policymaking. Across portfolios, youth participation is recognised as essential to democratic legitimacy, policy effectiveness, and long-term sustainability. Commissioners consistently commit to integrating youth perspectives into areas ranging from climate, economy, health, and digital policy to external action, security, and social inclusion.

A central element of these commitments is the systematic organisation of annual Youth Policy Dialogues by nearly all Commissioners. These dialogues are presented as the primary instrument for engaging directly with young people on portfolio-specific policies, enabling the collection of insights, concerns, and expectations.

Between 6 December 2024 and 10 March 2025, 28 Youth Policy Dialogues took place during the first 100 days of the new mandate of the EC. However, it is unclear if there was systematic follow-up and if young people’s views actually fed into policymaking.

Youth mainstreaming across policy areas

While a post-2027 framework should retain a core youth strategy, mainstreaming should be strengthened in parallel. According to the EPRS evaluation, youth mainstreaming across policy areas remains fragmented. Best practices exist where Member States institutionalised cross-sectoral youth policy coordination; however, in many cases, youth policy remains siloed.

According to the EPRS evaluation, the policy areas of environment and climate change, education, youth, employment, international development, and agriculture are already well mainstreamed (though unevenly across Member States) and continue to be highly relevant.

According to the EP Flash Survey Youth survey 2024, cost of living (40%) and housing (23%) are some of the top concerns among youth in the EU. According to the study on Housing affordability problems across socio-demographic groups, young people are finding the current housing environment particularly challenging because they tend to be on lower incomes, have insecure employment contracts, or lack access to adequate social protection.

According to the EPRS evaluation, housing, (mental) health, well-being, digitalisation, competition, sustainability, defence, and finance are important to young people but remain insufficiently mainstreamed. Such issues cannot be confined to a single youth strategy. Topics such as competitiveness, skills, democracy, EU citizenship, values, and identity should also be more widely integrated across relevant policy areas rather than addressed mainly within youth policy. Competitiveness and skills development should be more visible in employment and skills policies; democracy and threats to it should go under civic participation policies; and civic education should be embedded within formal education. This may also connect with broader EU initiatives such as the European Democracy Shield.

5. Youth participation and inclusion