After two additional presentations on interinstitutional Cloud strategy and a working group on document formats, the morning session closed with a debate
on data protection chaired by Mr Giovanni Buttarelli, the European Data Protection Supervisor.
The afternoon session saw an exposé on IT security by Mr Niall O’Higgins from the Economic and Social Committee which was the catalyst for a lengthy
discussion on the constant evolution of threats and the need for more collaboration between EU institutions in terms of cyber security.
Mr Steven Quest, Director-General of the Commission’s DIGIT, followed with a presentation on open source software strategy within the European Commission
underlying the action plans and strategies for the future. In addition, he drew up the main strategy for a future office automation environment pointing out that the worldwide IT market influences us and that there is a constant need to evolve and to define
a common strategy for the EU institutions.
The meeting continued with exchanges of views on the possibility to cooperate on the staff recruitment process, in particular, for highly specialised
sectors of IT like ICT and cyber-security following the approach set out by DG ITEC.
In addition, the members discussed how to better share the workload of interinstitutional tendering procedures amongst participating EU institutions
and agreed to look at ways to improve the current synergies.
The meeting concluded with a short information note by the EDPS on the IPEN initiative for privacy on the internet.
Currently, the members of the CII are the following:
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European Parliament (chair)
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European Commission
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Council of the EU
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European Court of Justice
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European Central Bank
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European Court of Auditors
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European Data Protection Supervisor
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European Economic and Social Committee
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Committee of the Regions
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European External Action Service
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European Investment Bank
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EU Agencies (for example: ENISA, the * European Network and Information Security Agency)
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Eurocontrol
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European Patent Office
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Publications Office
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The Office of the Hungarian National Assembly is about to launch an internal project called
Parlex aiming to introduce specific software which will enable members of Parliament to table legislative amendments electronically. The Hungarian experts involved in the project paid particular
attention to AT4AM, the authoring tool developed by DG ITEC for facilitating the European Parliament’s legislative work by creating, modifying and deleting an amendment or tabling and printing
it. They didn’t hesitate to avail of the practical assistance and know-how from their DG ITEC colleagues. It was the beginning of a correspondence that resulted in a full day presentation on AT4AM and the European Parliament IT strategy.
The Delegation was composed of 4 members of the Office of the Hungarian National Assembly: Dr Tibor Bárány Deputy Director General for Legislation, Mr
Zoltán Bukvai, Head of Division for Information and Document Management, Mrs Andrea Turgonyiné Juhász, IT expert and Mr András Gyula Kádas, project manager.
During the first day of the study visit, DG ITEC presented the
European Parliament’s IT projects relating to the legislative procedure
in the EP. The agenda included the tools and platforms developed by DG ITEC for allowing Members to ask for the advice of a pool of lawyers-linguists to draft legislative amendments (Drafting Support Tool, DST), for facilitating the drafting
process (AT4Lex) and for improving the signature flow by using a digital signature (DiSP).
Τools for supporting the plan of EP activities and for helping committee secretariats to organize and manage the legislative process (Programming Board,
PROBO and ITER) were also presented. In addition, the XML document format as well as the E-committee and E-meeting platforms that gather together, in one place, all information, committee and meeting documents were demonstrated.
The visit also provided the opportunity for DG ITEC to present its vision and strategy in an integrated way with all components of the
"Parliament of tomorrow" program which has been developed since 2010 and is currently used in the EP paving the way of, mobility, paperless offices and efficiency.
Presenting its tools related to AT4AM, DG ITEC showcased its daily contribution to the work of the MEPs to exercise their mandate, both inside and outside
the EP premises, for the development of a vibrant European democracy. In this context, DG ITEC underlined its concrete purpose to strengthen communication with National Parliaments, European citizens and civil societies through sustainable and high quality
service in the usage of ICT.
"Thanks for this full day" Dr Tibor Bárány declared at the end of the day, "What we saw today is a huge integrated system of IT legislative tools. We
had the opportunity to visit other National Parliaments, but nothing was as developed as in your Institution". "What we have seen today is our future" Mrs Andrea Turgonyiné Juhász said, smiling.
The DG ITEC Forum 2014 was a three day event held in the European Parliament back in November.
It featured a conference, two special workshops, interviews with the Secretary-General of the Dutch Senate, Mr Geert Jan Hamilton, Members of the European
Parliament, the chair of the LIBE committee, Mr Claude Moraes and an exhibition of some of the services offered by DG ITEC to MEPs and staff in relation to Mobility.
The Forum website has been updated. It contains a number of new items such as videos, interviews, pictures and the special Newsletter edition.
Check it out here.
