From 1 January to 30 June 2013 Ireland will hold the Presidency in the Council of the European Union. This is the seventh time Ireland has held the Presidency, the last being in 2004. Ireland will seek to progress a number of issues both in the Administrative Commission and the Council during its Presidency.

In the Council

The next round of miscellaneous amendments to Regulations 883/2004 and 987/2009 will not be published during the Irish Presidency. However, Ireland will seek to make progress on a number of other important dossiers in the broader area of mobility of workers including:

• the Pensions Portability Directive,
• Professional Qualifications,
• the Posting of Workers Enforcement Directive,
• the Enforcement Directive on Mobility of Workers.

In addition, Ireland aims to make significant progress on the Youth Employment Package and, in particular, the introduction of a Youth Guarantee.

In the Administrative Commission

Issues surrounding the relationship between the Coordinating Regulations and the Residence Directive have strongly featured a number of AC meetings. The question of habitual residence is an important element in these discussions (cf the 2011 trESS Analytical Study). An Ad-hoc Group dealing with residence will present a report to the AC in March and Ireland will carefully examine the options for follow-up work in this area.

A number of other reports will also be presented to the AC during the Irish Presidency including:

• the trESS report on benefits with activation measures,
• the final report of the Ad-hoc Group on child raising periods,
• the final report from the Statistics Ad-hoc group,
• a report from the group dealing with the exchange of medical information.

Ireland will review these reports and consider how the discussions on the issues raised can be advanced.

Ireland considers it is time to take stock of the experience of Member States in preparing for the transposition of the Patients Mobility Directive in 2013 and its interaction with the EU Coordination Regulations. This will be done at a Working Party meeting in April 2013.

EESSI remains an important element in the modernisation of the coordinating system and the Irish Presidency hopes to make progress on a number of key objectives including a new governance structure for the project and the completion of the current requirements gathering exercise. The question of extending the transitional period for implementing EESSI may also need to be addressed.

See www.consilium.europa.eu