On 11-12 June, liberal leaders, European Commissioners, party leaders, decision-makers and other guests gathered online for the ALDE eCongress to discuss some of the most defining challenges of our time.

Key highlights from these two days include:

Congress opening ceremony starts the 2-day programme

Featuring a tribute to late ALDE Party President Hans van Baalen and words from acting ALDE Party co-Presidents Timmy Dooley and Ilhan Kyuchyuk.

European Commission Executive Vice-President Margrethe Vestager shared a powerful message with attendees: “One thing is for sure – we must not rebuild the world as we knew it before. We must renew, build better and stronger.”

ALDE Council meeting takes place during Congress

Friday’s ALDE Party Council meeting included a special segment on the Conference on the Future of Europe, with guest speakers LYMEC President Antoaneta Asenova and Guy Verhofstadt MEP, who said: “We think the Conference of the Future of Europe is absolutely necessary because every time there is a crisis we see there is action by Europe, but we are, in many cases, far too weak, too late in our reaction.”

Congress elects new party Bureau

An ALDE Party Bureau election was held during the Congress, which saw the mandates of Vice Preisdents Henrik Bach Mortensen, Dita Charanzová MEP and Luis Garicano MEP renewed and David Burke elected to the position of ALDE Party Treasurer.

A range of resolutions adopted during Congress

During the Congress, numerous resolutions addressing current challenges affecting our societies and economies were adopted. A full list of resolutions adopted will soon be available here.

Insightful panel discussions gather together high-level liberal leaders

On smart spending for COVID-19 economic recovery, Prime Minister of the Netherlands Mark Rutte remarked, “It is crucial to enable companies to invest and grow over the coming years. Governments, banks and investors need to cooperate to prevent companies from financial collapse just before or after reaching the finish line – including small and medium enterprises.”

Taoiseach of the Repulic of Ireland Micheál Martin added, “The European effort to develop, manufacture and distribute COVID-19 vaccines should be seen as an enormous success (. . .) Europe is the engine behind the global answer to a global challenge.”

On strengthening democracies and freedoms as we recover from the COVID-19 pandemic, Prime Minister of Belgium Alexander De Croo said, “Like the coronavirus, we see that autocratic tendencies on our continent are quite contagious and they are spreading from one Member State to the other. As we have been effective in stopping the spread of the virus, we should also be as effective in stopping the spread of this.” 

European Commission Vice-President Věra Jourová added, “If the people do not trust that democracy works for them and that liberal democracy works for them, we will lose. We will lose the people and we will lose the chance to keep this kind of governance.”

To view all streamed sessions from the ALDE eCongress, have a look at our Facebook or YouTube pages

If you want to use photos from the ALDE eCongress, check out our Flickr page

For some of the top social media moments, search #ALDECongress on Twitter and Instagram

You can watch video highlights from the Congress below or on YouTube