The State of the European Union address of 2025 was largely dominated by the Russia-Ukraine war, the Gaza genocide, and the geopolitical shifts in which the EU is trying to remain a global leader. The EU has been fighting to increase its military capabilities, however, stability within the EU cannot be only about (re)arming Europe and investing in defence. In light of the rising cost of living, persisting labour shortages, democratic backsliding, markets instabilities and the looming climate crisis, it is ever more important to ensure meaningful, quality jobs, democratic participation in decision-making, access to affordable services, twin transition for enterprises and protecting social rights.

To this end, CECOP welcomes the Commission’s efforts to design a Quality Jobs Act. It is imperative that cooperatives play a key role in this, as enterprises experienced in providing quality, meaningful, and empowering jobs. CECOP urges the EU to recognize and promote worker-owned cooperatives as a model for quality employment by removing legal and financial barriers, supporting training, and enabling workers’ buyouts of companies. We call for a robust EU Quality Jobs Roadmap with clear indicators, coherence with existing social policies, social conditionality in public funding, and greater promotion of cooperative education and governance.

CECOP is also looking forward to the upcoming Anti-Poverty Strategy, as cooperatives, and particularly social cooperatives, contribute to the prevention and alleviation of poverty. Recognising the difficult financial situation that most EU citizens find themselves in, the Commission President also mentioned upcoming packages on affordability and the cost of living. CECOP calls on the Commission to target essential services and social services of general interest, which are often underfunded, and of which cooperatives are important providers in many local communities and provide many advantages in comparison to for-profit actors. They ensure affordable essential services for all groups of the population, including vulnerable and disadvantaged groups and bring solutions to overcome barriers in access linked to income, age, territorial inequalities and spatial segregation.  

Although the address did not reveal many new initiatives, President von der Leyen announced a Single Market Roadmap, which will include a fifth freedom, on top of the free movement of people, goods, services, and capital: knowledge and innovation. As Enrico Letta pointed it out in his report on the Single Market, research, innovation, and education are “a cornerstone of European integration”. While CECOP welcomes the inclusion of a fifth freedom in the Single Market, we urge the Commission to explicitly include education in it.

 

“To increase our competitiveness, we need to close the skills gap in strategic sectors. Investing in knowledge, research, training, and education is essential. Cooperatives improve if they improve people. Cooperatives, guided by the cooperative principles ‘education, training, and information’, are characterised by lifelong learning, thus enabling workers to quickly respond to changes. Now is the time to act – not only in principle but via coherent actions.” – Giuseppe Guerini, President of CECOP

Similarly, the emphasis on innovation may be important for the EU to not lose its competitive edge, but it should not be limited to technology and digitalisation. Although cooperatives successfully operate in these key sectors and their contribution to technological innovation should be acknowledged, innovation also lies in their governance model. Cooperatives are highly flexible enterprises, thanks to their democratic governance and their seven guiding cooperative principles. As such, they are quick to react to socioeconomic changes through social innovation, as demonstrated by the rise of platform cooperatives (a cooperative response to the rising prominence of platform work), or multistakeholder cooperatives in some crucial sectors such as energy (which guarantee ownership of the energy supply by the people using it) or mobility, just to name few.

One of the most crucial topics coming up in the EU is the revision of the EU Public Procurement Directive. It is regrettable that despite its prominence on the EU agenda, the only mention it received in the speech was regarding the “Made in Europe” criteria. The aim of public procurement should be to ensure that jobs and profits remain in the EU, and we urge the Commission to take into account the vital effort of cooperatives that work hard on ensuring that wealth is retained within the local community.

CECOP regrets that the European Pillar of Social Rights (EPSR) was not mentioned in the address, in spite of the upcoming new Action Plan. The EPSR should remain high on the EU agenda, as the EU’s social compass, guiding reference framework toward a more fair, inclusive, and people-centered Europe.

Commission President von der Leyen mentioned democracy multiple times. In light of the weakening of democratic values and the erosion of the rule of law across the EU, it is necessary to keep this on the agenda. In order to protect democracy, it is imperative to strengthen civic education and partner up with cooperatives whose inherent democratic nature can significantly contribute to safeguarding democracy in society as a whole.