Article – Parliament this week: Covid-19, refugees, chemicals

The environment and public health committee will discuss the EU strategy for Covid-19 vaccines, which aims to speed up the evelopment of a vaccine through a joint EU approach, with Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides on Monday. Comittee members will also debate the pandemic with Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director-general of the World Health Organization, on Thursday.

On Tuesday, the employment and social affairs committee will vote on updates to EU employment guidelines to help mitigate the impact of the coronavirus pandemic, including recommendations to boost jobs and improve access to work.

Ahead of the European Commission issuing a proposal for a chemicals strategy for sustainability later this year, the envirfonment and public health comitee is expected to call for it to ensure high levels of protection for people’s health and the environment in a vote on Thursday.

The budgets committee will discuss the recovery plan and the EU’s next long-term budget on Monday. The following day Parliament President David Sassoli and the political group leaders will discuss the budget negotiations with Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.

On Wednesday, the budgets committe will vote on the mobilisation of €100 million in EU aid to support Syrian refugees in Jordan and Lebanon and €485 million to continue urgent humanitarian help for refugees in Turkey.

Manuel Navarrete, the head of Europol’s European Counter Terrorism Centre, will present the 2020 EU Terrorism Situation and Trend Report to the civil liberties committee on Tuesday. It includes data on terrorism in the EU and identifies trends in crime.