2 October 2026
On 29 September 2026, Valeria Ronzitti, General Secretary of SGI Europe, participated in the Implementation Dialogue convened by Executive Vice-President Raffaele Fitto on the forthcoming Right to Stay Strategy.
This was the occasion for the SGI Europe General Secretary to highlight that making the Freedom to Stay a genuine choice requires affordable, accessible and high-quality Services of General Interest. Energy, water, transport, housing, healthcare and postal services are essential to ensuring that people can continue living and working in their territories.
SGI Europe underlined that delivering this ambition requires an integrated approach involving SGIs, social partners, local and regional authorities, enterprises and civil society. Coherence across EU legislation and investment priorities, together with an adequately skilled workforce, must underpin this effort.
To translate this ambition into practice, SGI Europe called for a systemic approach to Services of General Interest. A systematic assessment of EU initiatives should accompany this to determine whether they are financially viable, affordable across territories and supported by the workforce needed for their implementation.
SGI Europe also advocated a dedicated Freedom to Stay indicator within the European Semester, alongside the Freedom to Stay integration into the next EU budget. These priorities would help connect the Strategy’s objectives with the policy coordination and investment needed to deliver them.
Through the Coalition for the Freedom to Stay, SGI Europe stands ready to support this work, bringing together stakeholders to help turn the Strategy into practical improvements for businesses, people, territories and service providers.
Contact: Benoit Cassorla
On 28 September, Joanna Makowiecka-Gatza, President of Employers of Poland and Vice-President of SGI Europe, and Tor Hatlevoll, Chair of SGI Europe’s Macroeconomic Taskforce, joined Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis for an Implementation Dialogue on the Recovery and Resilience Facility. They highlighted the conditions needed to translate European economic priorities into effective SGI delivery.
The Commission invited participants to examine how to strengthen the implementation of the European Semester’s country-specific recommendations and better reflect regional and local realities. These recommendations help guide reforms and investment, making their design and implementation directly relevant to providers of services of general interest.
Tor Hatlevoll underlined the need to connect economic coordination with practical delivery conditions. Drawing on Sweden’s experience, he explained that investment pressures can shift between levels of government, affecting the resources available for SGIs. He called for clearer multiannual planning and stronger involvement of those implementing recommendations. He also highlighted the difficulty of turning successful EU-funded projects into lasting service provision.
Joanna Makowiecka-Gatza stressed that common European objectives must account for different national and regional starting points, particularly in energy, competitiveness, security and resilience. She emphasised the importance of involving enterprises, employers and social partners from the outset of policymaking, ensuring that their experience informs the development of workable policies.
SGI Europe’s contribution centred on matching European ambitions with the resources and capacity required to deliver them. Meaningful participation by SGI providers and social partners can help connect reform priorities, investment decisions and implementation, supporting SGIs that meet citizens’ and businesses’ needs across the European Union.
Contact: Guillaume Afellat
On 29 September, SGI Europe General Secretary Valeria Ronzitti joined an exchange of views with European Commission Executive Vice-President Roxana Minzatu and the European social partners on the priorities for the Commission Work Programme 2027. During the meeting, SGI Europe called on the European Commission to make 2027 a year of delivery, ensuring EU ambitions translate into services citizens and enterprises can rely on across all territories.
SGI Europe stressed that services of general interest, including care, housing, transport, healthcare, education, energy, water and digital connectivity, must be recognised as productive infrastructure. They enable people to participate in the labour market, businesses to recruit and invest, and territories to remain attractive. Strong SGIs are also essential to making the Freedom to Stay a reality.
During the exchange, SGI Europe presented three concrete proposals. First, the European Semester should strengthen its assessment of access to SGIs, using existing processes to connect territorial gaps directly with reforms and investment. Second, an “SGI check” should be introduced into Better Regulation so that the impact of new initiatives on providers’ operational capacity, financing, workforce and territorial access is considered before policy choices are fixed. Third, the European Competitiveness Fund should have a stronger territorial dimension and ensure that eligible SGI projects can access support in all EU regions, including those with weaker investment capacity.
SGI Europe’s members are ready to deliver Europe’s social, competitiveness and resilience objectives. This requires EU policy to match new expectations with adequate funding, workable regulation, realistic implementation timelines and a credible workforce strategy. SGI Europe stands ready to work with the Commission to ensure that the 2027 programme closes the gap between European commitments and people’s experience of essential services.
Contact: Maxime Staelens
SGI Europe has responded to the European Commission’s Call for Evidence on the upcoming Housing Simplification Package, which aims to identify regulatory and administrative obstacles affecting housing supply as part of the European Affordable Housing Plan.
In its response, SGI Europe welcomes the Commission’s efforts to address unnecessary complexity and calls for the Package to deliver a clearer, more coherent and proportionate regulatory framework for the construction and renovation of housing. With access to affordable, sustainable and quality housing becoming an increasingly pressing challenge across Europe, simplification should translate into tangible improvements in investment capacity, shorter procedures and faster project delivery.
SGI Europe stresses that housing providers and public authorities are affected by the cumulative impact of rules across a wide range of policy areas. The response identifies practical challenges linked, among others, to the SGEI framework, taxation and prudential rules, the EU Taxonomy, public procurement, building energy performance, waste legislation and electricity-market rules.
In particular, SGI Europe calls for a framework that better supports investment in social and affordable housing, avoids disproportionate financing and reporting burdens, and makes public procurement and permitting procedures simpler and more predictable. It also highlights the need for a workable implementation of the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive, greater legal certainty for circular renovation and material reuse, and sufficient flexibility for local energy solutions and projects affected by grid constraints.
Across these different areas, SGI Europe underlines that EU rules should better reflect the realities of long-term housing investment and the diversity of national housing models.
Contact: Raquel Carro-Andollo
On 30th September, SGI Europe joined a broad coalition of telecommunications associations, local authority networks, and cross-sectoral business alliances in issuing a joint statement urging European Union policymakers to accelerate the continent’s transition from legacy copper to full-fibre connectivity.
The joint declaration emphasises that Europe’s technological sovereignty, economic competitiveness, and digital ambitions, ranging from artificial intelligence deployment and cloud services to tripling data centre capacity, depend directly on resilient, future-proof digital infrastructure. The signatories warn that without decisive regulatory action under the proposed Digital Networks Act (DNA), full-fibre coverage across the EU risks being delayed until 2051, missing the official target of Gigabit connectivity for all by 2030.
Citing European Commission impact assessment figures, the coalition notes that a well-managed copper-to-fibre transition could generate an accumulated €327 billion GDP boost between 2025 and 2035. Furthermore, replacing energy-intensive copper with high-efficiency fibre networks is projected to cut carbon emissions by 5.1% over the same timeframe.
To realise these benefits, SGI Europe and partner organisations call on European institutions to strengthen the Digital Networks Act by establishing an objective, rule-based copper switch-off framework. Rather than waiting until 2035 to define criteria, the statement presses policymakers to immediately develop technical implementation details and trigger phase-outs gradually based on granular homes passed thresholds.
The stakeholders across multiple sectors, including alternative telecom operators, SGI employers, local government associations, and infrastructure investors, stress that high-capacity connectivity is essential for SGIs, digital education, and rural development under the Commission’s 'Right to Stay' strategy. Providing clear regulatory certainty will unlock the sustained investment needed to secure Europe's digital future.
Contact: Henriette Gleau
Join us, stay informed
Subscribe to have all the latest news and developments delivered straight to your inbox.