Chairman of the European Union Affairs Committee of the Riigikogu (Parliament of Estonia) Kalle Palling today meets with the chairpersons of the European Union Affairs Committees of Latvia, Lithuania and Poland in Riga. He will speak about Estonia’s experience in regulating sharing economy and discuss making a proposal to the European Commission on establishing a facility to resolve the migration crisis.

The Riigikogu is working on amendments to the Public Transport Act that would create a clear and simple regulation for ridesharers and establish requirements to electronic platforms for mediating rides. “The state must create a regulation to support the initiative of people, regulate the services, protect the consumers and collect the taxes,” Palling said.

In Palling’s opinion, sharing economy is a growing form of economic activity, through which the choices for consumers and the enterprisingness of population will increase significantly. He added that sharing economy would increase the number of micro-businesses and thus also the tax revenue of the state.

Migration issues will also be discussed at meeting of the chairpersons of the European Union Affairs Committees of the Baltic States and Poland in Riga The discussions will deal with the problems connected to the relocation of refugees. The agreement of the EU and Turkey on the returning of refugees will also be spoken about.

Palling has said that in order to solve the migrant crisis, the whole Mediterranean region together with North Africa had to be treated as one. He thinks that the best possible solution is be to create an investment programme for the region that would help increase the standard of living, create jobs, enable access to education and medical care, and in this way, reduce the underlying reasons for migration. Palling suggested the same idea to the First Vice-President of the European Committee Frans Timmermans at their meeting in Tallinn last week.

The chairs of the European Union Affairs Committees of the four countries will also discuss issues relating to border control. In Palling’s opinion, the control of the external borders of the European Union has to be strengthened, and exchange of information between countries should be improved. He thinks that, in order to tackle the security threats, each person who crosses the border should be given an e-identity.

A separate discussion will be held in Riga on the issues of strategic communication in connection with Russia’s information war. The situation in Ukraine will also be spoken about at the meeting.

In the area of economy, the discussion will focus on the impact of the Nordic Stream II pipeline on the gas market of Central and Eastern Europe.

Riigikogu Press Service
Epp-Mare Kukemelk
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