CEEP closed today its 15th Annual Local Enterprises Conference with a declaration highlighting the key role of innovative local public services for growth in Europe.

"Local public services providers are fully engaged in a process of modernisation of their mission of providing public services to citizens and businesses in their territories. This modernisation through innovation aims above all at improving the quality, affordability, safety and effectiveness of those services and takes place both in the operational management of the enterprises and in their daily activities" declared Hans-Joachim RECK, President of CEEP, echoing the final declaration of the conference.

The 16,000 local enterprises representatives gathered in CEEP called on European policy makers to better take into account their added-value and specificities when setting the legal and financing framework impacting the provision of Services of General Interest.

“Being innovative requires having the capacities and tools to act, added Valeria RONZITTI, General Secretary of CEEP. “Therefore, Local public services’ providers call for a pragmatic and proportionate approach which will allow to draw up the main lines of the “tool box” at their disposal when providing SGIs, giving them the necessary room for manoeuvre to effectively carry out their mission. This will enable even further local public services’ enterprises to be an engine for investments and growth in Europe."

For more details, the Final Declaration of the 15th CEEP Annual Local Enterprises Conference is available here

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For further information, please contact:

Priya Klinkenberg- tel. +32 (0) 2 229 21 40

CEEP gathers enterprises and organisations from across Europe, both public and private, at national, regional and local level, which are public employers or providers of services of general interest. CEEP members contribute to more than 26% of EU GDP and employ 30% of the EU workforce; CEEP is one of the three general corss-industry European Social Partners.