The State of the European Union. The European Parliament faces its most important elections yet

THE STATE OF THE EUROPEAN UNION 96 in question are currently under revision, the first two as part of the reform of the Common European System of Asylum (CEAS) and the third as part of a routine procedure of recasting. Due to a lack of consensus on a number of is- sues and a hiatus in activity caused by upcoming May 2019 EU parliamentary elections, new ver- sions are not expected to be issued in the im- mediate future. The conclusions adopted at the 28 June 2018 European Council meeting stressed the need to accelerate the effective return of irregular mi- grants, a notion President Junker repeated in his September 2018 State of the Union address. To this end, the European Commission has presented a proposal to recast Directive 2008/115/EC on common standards and proce- dures in Member States for returning illegally staying third-country nationals drafted by European leaders at the 18-19 September 2018 summit meeting in Salzburg. A previous recom- mendation issued by the Council in 2017 in- tended to improve the efficiency of returns im- plemented under Directive 2008/115/EC does not appear to have had the intended effect. The European Commission has identified what it considers to be two major circumstances hindering the effective return of irregular mi- grants. One is the inefficiency and lack of coher- ence of return practices, which tend to vary considerably from country to country. It has been observed, for example, that ‘inconsistent definitions interpretations of the risk of ab- sconding and the use of detention result in the absconding of irregular migrants and in second- ary movements absconding and secondary movements’. The second is the fact that the ef- ficiency of the EU’s return policy hinges to a great extent on the cooperation of countries of origin. The Union has made significant progress on this issue by negotiating non-binding return and readmission agreements with countries of origin. The Commission has urged Member States to make greater use such mechanisms to boost their rates of return and use Schengen visa requirements as leverage in negotiations with third-country cooperation on return and readmission issues. As proposed, the recast version of the Return Directive would simplify return procedures, es- tablish a link between asylum procedures and return procedures and reduce the risk of ab- sconding. From the perspective of the Commission, the pending recast of the directive should: – Establish a new border procedure for the im- mediate return of individuals whose applica- tions have been rejected following a border procedure. – Provide a clear framework of cooperation between irregular migrants and competent national authorities, streamline the rules on the granting of a period for voluntary depar- ture and establish a framework for the granting of financial, material and in-kind assistance to irregular migrants willing to re- turn voluntarily. – Establish more efficient instruments to man- age and facilitate the administrative process- ing of returns, the exchange of information among competent authorities and the exe- cution of return. – Ensure coherence and synergies with asylum procedures. – Ensure a more effective use of detention to support the enforcement of returns. Balancing compliance with their responsibili- ties as envisaged in the proposed new version of the EU Return Directive and commitments re- lated to the Global Pact on Migration will un- doubtedly be a challenge for signatories of the UN agreement.