Association's activities Developments in PIL EAPIL Public consultations

Vulnerable Adults – EAPIL Working Group Tasked with Responding to a Public Consultation

The European Commission has launched a public consultation on the prospect of an EU-wide protection for vulnerable adults, i.e., persons aged 18 or more who are unable to protect their interests because of an impairment or insufficiency of their personal faculties.

In the document presenting the initiative, the Commission notes that vulnerable adults, together with their legal representatives, “currently face multiple barriers when they move abroad, buy or sell properties, or just manage their bank account in another Member State”. This is so, “because the rules governing cross-border cases (private international law rules) differ from one Member State to another”.

Actually, none of the legislative measures enacted  so far by the Union on the basis of Article 81 TFEU deals with the support that vulnerable needs may need to access to exercise their legal capacity.

The aim of the consultation is to “gather evidence on the problem and its consequences and to give all interested parties the opportunity to share their views on the possible policy options”.

The deadline for contributing to the consultation is 29 March 2022.

The Scientific Council of the European Association of Private International Law has approved a proposal for the creation of a Working Group charged with drafting a response to the consultation on behalf of the Association.

The members of the group are Pietro Franzina (co-chair), Estelle Gallant, Cristina González Beilfuss (co-chair), Katja Karjalainen, Thalia Kruger, Tamás Szabados and Jan von Hein.

The Working Group plans to hold a webinar in the coming weeks in order to publicly present a preliminary draft and collect the views of experts and stakeholders.

Further details will be made available in the Group’s dedicated page.

For information: pietro.franzina@unicatt.it.

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