The former European Commissioner for Transport Adina Valean, currently a member of the European Parliament from the PNL, expressed her doubts about the efficiency that the organization of the new European Commission could have, in which six executive vice-presidents will coordinate the European commissioners from the member countries and in which numerous responsibilities are shared between several portfolios.

Adina Valean discussed this topic with Romanian journalists on Wednesday in Brussels, on the sidelines of the hearings of the designated executive vice-presidents of the European Commission held the day before. The former European Commissioner for Transport made a comparison with the way the first commission led by Ursula von der Leyen, of which she was part, was run, in which there were three executive vice-presidents – Frans Timmermans (responsible for the European Green Deal), Margrethe Vestager (responsible for Europe’s transition into the digital age) and Valdis Dombrovskis (responsible for an economy that benefits people).

The PNL MEP says that the vice-presidents she worked with were „quite ideological (…), each completely different” and that they acted like bosses over their subordinates.

„In the sense that the Transport field was affiliated to Timmermans, so under the climate [European Green Pact]. In other words, whatever legislation we made, we had to get a tick from Timmermans”, explained Adina Valean.

„Very difficult, because there is a difference between what the transport has to do to work and in a way we were ‘lucky’ with the COVID, because then it was seen and it shocked everyone what it means to stop transport and the paradigm has changed a bit. The work was hard”, added the former European Commissioner for Transport.

„The vice-presidents did not have any special role. Now there are six and theoretically there is talk of coordination. I don’t know how it will be organized, if the line commissioners will need a tick from the executive vice-presidents or not on everything they propose. I did mathematics and I have a more organized mind. I could not work like this, in a generalized chaos. I mean, someone has to be responsible for something, so that we know who we are asking about this. And this idea of collaborating in some cases, I don’t know how many directorates general, is cumbersome, I say. So I don’t know if it will really be effective”, she expressed her opinion a day after the hearing in the European Parliament of the six designated vice-presidents of the future European Commission.

AGERPRES