Statement of the LAMG to the HLPF Open Debate, 9 July 2015 Delivered by Emilia Saiz, UCLG His Excellency President of ECOSOC, Excellences, colleagues and partners, I am honored to speak today on behalf of the Local Authorities Major Group supported by the Global Taskforce of Local and Regional Governments. We would like to reiterate our commitment to actively contribute to the implementation of the new agenda, which we have been shaping together over the past years. The release of the final draft yesterday has shown us how much progress we have made in defining a truly universal and comprehensive roadmap for action. The outcome of the Post 2015 Summit is clearly set out to go beyond a political declaration, which we clearly need. It is also meant to be an action-oriented agenda which sets out, not only what is desirable, but what is imperative. As the closest level of government to the people, for local and regional governments, this agenda is not a choice, but our daily responsibility. The goals set out are indivisible and interrelated. Indeed, our commitment is not only to contribute to the achievement of Goal 11, but to all 17 Goals. We commend member states for having made the effort to include all dimensions of development and welcome references over the past days to the importance of ensuring the involvement of national, regional and global levels. We feel, however, that the local level deserves special attention as it will be instrumental in the successful implementation of the agenda. We agree this agenda will necessitate all available commitments and leadership. In this light it would be a missed opportunity not to harness on the potential of the hundreds of thousands of local and subnational governments with responsibility for service provision and planning of cities and territories worldwide. We therefore would like to see the High Level Political Forum, under the auspices and strong political guidance of ECOSOC, to become a true platform for monitoring that would enable the transmission of knowledge between key constituencies such as local and subnational governments with the decision making structures.
The Forum will need to have a more targeted agenda, considering relations among goals. It will need to have informed opinions from constituencies focusing on problem-solving. A constituency-based approach might be, in this case, more relevant than a GOAL-oriented approach. The current formats are probably NOT fit for purpose yet, to answer the question raised yesterday by Ambassador Kamau. NO. This a new way of going about our global future that will require NEW data, NEW governance, NEW policy making. It will challenge all of us to change and no single sphere of government or mechanism is fit for the challenge as yet. Finally, we would like to commend the important inputs provided by the rest of the major groups which help us shape our positions and, most importantly, our policies back home. The coordination efforts among major groups have been very significant and we hope they will be duly recognized in the future sessions of the HLPF. We would like to end by recalling the important responsibility we all have to ensure adequate means and an enabling environment for this challenging agenda. The conference in Addis Ababa should send a clear sign of commitment in this respect. Local and sub-national governments the world round, organized in national, regional and global associations, look forward to putting our shared goals in place and seeing the objectives of the Post 2015 Summit embedded in the New Urban Agenda to be shaped next year in the Habitat III Conference.
Thank you
