Honourable Luigi Berlinguer, Member of the European Parliament, held his speech about the European Parliaments pilot project on judicial training.

Mr. Berlinguer stated that here has been a fundamental change in the European Parliaments approach towards judicial training. Because of the entry into force of the Lisbon treaty, the objectives set down in the Stockholm programme, and an enormous European ius commune, the role of the members of the judiciary and judicial staff becomes crucial.

All judicial authorities should have an in depth knowledge of the European legal instruments in this field, a sufficient knowledge of foreign languages and legal terminology. Training activities should include staff exchanges, study visits, working shops, seminars, the development of online modules, based on information communication technologies and a further development of e-learning tools. Mr. Berlinguer pointed out that these activities should be organised and promoted by already existing specialized bodies and organisations.

Judges are not be addressed as children sitting behind desks, waiting to be taught a lesson. Their starting point, Mr. Berlinguer underlined, should be not so much a general approach, but rather individual cases, individual problems that judges have to deal with. 

A key role should be played by the existing legal networks which should coordinate the action on the various national structures without replacing them.

The EU should support member states best practices and encourage successful institutions such as EU law coordinators and other examples in Italy and The Netherlands. This is, as Mr. Berlinguer emphasized, also the aim of the pilot project which is scheduled and run already at the end of 2012. It is of a paramount importance to create networks of judges of different cultures and improve of the coordinating of existing networks in order to create circles of coherence.

This is, as Mr. Berlinguer concluded, the philosophy of today: relations in an interconnected world. Europe interconnected is the reason why we are here.