European Commission - Daily News Daily News 03 / 11 / 2026 Brussels, 3 November 2026 EU Roma Strategic Framework brings positive progress on Roma rights across the EU with further efforts needed The European Commission has published the third implementation report on the EU Roma Strategic Framework , covering the period from June 2023 to March 2025. The report identifies how the framework is helping advance Roma equa...
European Commission - Daily News Daily News 03 / 11 / 2026 Brussels, 3 November 2026 EU Roma Strategic Framework brings positive progress on Roma rights across the EU with further efforts needed The European Commission has published the third implementation report on the EU Roma Strategic Framework , covering the period from June 2023 to March 2025. The report identifies how the framework is helping advance Roma equality, inclusion and participation across the Union, while also outlining the remaining challenges. Progress can be seen across areas such as employment, early childhood education and care, as well as strengthening national coordination of Roma equality and inclusion policies and increasing political recognition of antigypsyism. Severe material deprivation among Roma people has decreased significantly, from 62% in 2016 to 37% in 2024, while the proportion of young Roma in employment, education or training has risen from 38% to 53%. Housing deprivation has declined, from 61% to 47%. The proportion of Roma in paid employment has increased from 43% to 54%, with most employment-related targets expected to be reached by 2030 if the current progress continues. Participation in early childhood education and care has also risen from 42% to 53%, although it remains significantly below that of the general population. However, progress remains uneven and barriers remain to true equality for Roma people in Europe. Progress is stagnant in relation to segregation in education, overcrowding, paid gender work gap, discrimination experiences, and reporting of them. For example, only around one third of Roma young people complete upper secondary education, and nearly half of Roma children continue to attend segregated schools. 31% of Roma still experience ethnic discrimination. Moreover, poverty and social exclusion remain entrenched, with 77% of Roma children at risk of poverty and 40% of Roma households living in severe material deprivation. The Commission calls on Member States to sustain and ramp up the efforts needed to achieve the 2030 targets of the EU Roma strategic framework. More information is available in the press release . (For more information: Eva Hrncirova – Tel.: +32 2 298 84 33; Quentin Cortes - Tel: +32 2 291 32 83) Commission takes new steps to prepare Europeans for growing crisis risks As Europe faces increasingly frequent and complex crises, the European Commission is stepping up efforts to strengthen preparedness across the EU. From helping citizens protect themselves during emergencies to ensuring that national civil protection systems can keep operating when disaster strikes, the EU is delivering concrete measures to make Europe more resilient. Today, at the European Civil Protection Forum , Commissioner for Equality, Preparedness and Crisis Management Hadja Lahbib presented new guidelines to help people and communities prepare for emergencies, including during the first 72 hours of a crisis. She also announced plans for an annual EU Preparedness Day, with the first edition planned in October 2027. These initiatives build on a recently adopted Commission Recommendation on operational continuity and stress-testing to strengthen the resilience of national civil protection contact points across Europe. Together, they mark further progress in delivering the EU Preparedness Union Strategy, turning Europe's preparedness ambitions into practical action. More information is available in the press release . (For more information: Eva Hrncirova – Tel.: +32 2 298 84 33; Quentin Cortes - Tel: +32 2 291 32 83) Commission collects feedback on improving the repairability of products in the EU The European Commission has launched a public consultation and a call for evidence to prepare future EU ecodesign requirements that will make it easier for consumers to repair the products they buy. By setting new repairability requirements under the Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation (ESPR), the Commission supports the EU's ambition to have a more circular and competitive economy. Future reparability requirements will contribute to making a wide range of products placed on the EU market easier to repair, thus extending their lifetime and reducing waste. With those new requirements, consumers will benefit from longer-lasting products, lower repair costs, and more choice when fixing everyday items. The Commission is seeking feedback from all interested parties – including citizens, businesses, NGOs, public authorities, and researchers – to assess current repairability challenges faced by consumers and repairers, as well as possible measures to improve repairability, including access to spare parts or availability of repair and maintenance. The public consultation and call for evidence are open until 9 February 2027. The feedback will feed into the impact assessment work for a possible delegated act setting out new repairability requirements under the ESPR. The ESPR is a cornerstone of the EU's strategy to establish a single market for sustainable products. The Commission is now implementing the ESPR working plan 2025-2030 , with the preparation of delegated acts for priority product groups like iron and steel, textiles, aluminium, furniture, tyres, as well as horizontal measures on reparability and recycled content. You can find more information on the public consultation and call for evidence online. (For more information: Anna-Kaisa Itkonen - Tel.: +32 2 295 75 01; Maëlys Dreux - Tel.: +32 2 295 46 73) Commission conditionally approves JD.com's acquisition of CECONOMY under the Foreign Subsidies Regulation The European Commission has approved, under the Foreign Subsidies Regulation (‘FSR'), the acquisition of CECONOMY AG (‘CECONOMY') by JD.com, Inc. (‘JD.com'). The approval is conditional upon full compliance with the commitments offered by the parties. Today's decision follows the opening of an in-depth investigation into the proposed acquisition and the sending of a Statement of Grounds . During its in-depth investigation, the Commission gathered further information from the parties, as well as feedback from the parties' competitors, and found that JD.com received subsidies in the form of preferential financing, tax incentives and grants from the PRC that are liable to distort the internal market. To address the Commission's competition concerns, the parties offered to conduct intra-group transactions between JD.com and CECONOMY on market terms, to provide JD.com's warehousing and logistic services to third-party retailers on the same terms as those provided to CECONOMY, and to provide JD.com's technology services to third parties on the same terms as those provided to CECONOMY. The Commission found that these commitments fully and effectively remedy the distortion resulting from the identified foreign subsidies, by preventing cross-subsidisation from JD.com to CECONOMY and eliminating the combined entity's competitive advantage resulting from JD.com's subsidised logistic and technological capabilities. Executive Vice-President for a Clean, Just and Competitive Transition, Teresa Ribera , said: “ Consumers benefit from a competitive retail and e-commerce sector, with a level playing field for companies. The parties' constructive approach has enabled commitments that effectively address the identified foreign subsidies and their potential distortive effects in the internal market, including by preventing cross-subsidisation of the parties' European operations. ” A press release is available online. (For more information: Siobhan McGarry - Tel.: +32 2 296 47 98; Luuk de Klein – Tel.: +32 2 299 47 74) Entry into force or application of EU legislation - Key milestones, 1-30 November 2026 Tentative agendas for forthcoming Commission meetings Note that these items can be subject to changes. Upcoming events of the European Commission Eurostat press releases Calendar items of the President and Commissioners Individual calendars of the President and Commissioners MEX/26/2326 <@rel_link@>
Speech Brief