Does the EU's five-year plan recognise the urgency of our times?

Last night EU leaders picked their president and strategic agenda for the next term. But attempts to make it more ambitious were shot down. Is the EU on autopilot?

EU prime ministers and presidents emerged from the top jobs summit late last night with an underwhelming announcement: President Ursula von der Leyen is being reappointed for a second term, and the pre-cooked package of Antonio Costa as Council chairman, Kaja Kallas as foreign affairs chief and Roberta Metsola as Parliament speaker was confirmed. It was a result that had been assumed for months, but there was one surprise: far-right Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni refused to vote for von der Leyen, and also voted against Kallas and Costa. Her exact reasons are still murky, though it is assumed it was her revenge for being excluded from the precursor talks because she is not from one of the three centrist groups that have formed the governing majority in the European Parliament.

The leaders also adopted their New Strategic Agenda for the coming 2024-2029 term. This is essentially a set of instructions to President von der Leyen for the laws she should propose (subject to a majority confirmation vote by the European Parliament on 17 July). In this way the EU’s executive branch is a mixture of the European Commission and the European Council. The Commission President is the executive, but in theory (although this is murky in actual law and could be challenged by a courageous president) she takes instructions from the 27 prime ministers and presidents in the European Council.

The strategic agenda will now be poured over by us nerds in the Eurobubble for indications about what is to come in the following term, with the obvious caveat that, as the past term with Covid and Russia’s invasion showed us, the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry. The main elements people are looking at are whether the EU is going to remain committed to the Green Deal and to support for Ukraine. And on that, the document seems to give some worrying signs of a retreat from ambition.