On May 9th during a video conference meeting between the President of the CoR and Governor of the Central Macedonia region in Greece, Apostolos Tzitzikostas and the Italian delegation of the ECR Group at the European Committee of the Regions, Federico Martegani, a municipal councillor in the city of Tradate explained what initiatives his municipality, under the leadership of Mayor Giuseppe Bascialla took to battle the coronavirus.

In this meeting various national and local approaches to dealing with the coronavirus emergency were discussed at length. At the request of Mr Tzitzikostas, Mr Martegani presented the experience of the Tradate municipality in battling Covid-19 as “an example for the whole of Europe", he illustrated the best practices that were adopted by the Mayor, Giuseppe Bascialla, including “having the courage to take the difficult decision to quarantine entire families that had tested positive to Covid-19."

​“In this time of lockdown, it has been a positive and moving experience to participate in this virtual European meeting, held exclusively for the Italian representation in the ECR political group," said Mr Martegani. Other Italian participants in the meetings include the Presidents of Veneto Regional Council Roberto Ciambetti and Matteo Bianchi MP, The President of the Abruzzo region, Marco Marsilio and the Mayor of Ciampino, Daniela Ballico, as well as other key conservative Italian policy makers who are also members of the ECR Group. Mr Martegani concluded “To bring the experience from my town to Europe, is a great opportunity that I have also used to reiterate the calls of mayors and presidents of regions to be granted greater autonomy. It is important to draw attention to the high-quality front-line work being carried out by local bodies, those which are closet to citizens."