​Marc Hendrickx, Member of the Flemish Parliament participated in the CoR Athens Summit "European Recovery, Local Solutions" where he spoke in the workshop focussed on "Getting the delivery right: involving Europe's regions and cities".  In his contribution he stressed the importance of regional parliaments in scrutinising the EU legislation with a view to the respect of the principle of subsidiarity.  He said that Regional parliaments are best placed to assess and reflect citizens' needs and the Lisbon Treaty clearly acknowledges their importance in the Early Warning Mechanism. Despite this,  in practice, their experience and competences are not given enough importance, in the first place by National parliaments but often also by the European Commission which often sets too short deadlines for consultation.

Entrepreneurs need to be the leaders of an innovative future. Governments need to support the entrepreneurial consortiums. This needs to be at the appropriate level and this in his own Member State is Flanders and the Flemish Government.  There is a clear need to apply the subsidiarity principle to Entrepreneurship policy.
Governance mechanisms are necessary in regions to set priorities and stimulate clusters and the creation of networks of SMEs. Programmes have to be supported and monitored, and whenever needed adapted.  Governments must have a method to help entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial institutions to cluster on the basis of relative specialisation advantages.