The dialogue focused on the role of regions and cities in education and culture policies to help achieve the Lisbon goals. Vice President of the CoR, Luc van den Brande, emphasised the importance of ‘investing in culture’ and stressed the need to strengthen education, training, community building and social capital in order to encourage economic development and make progress in an ever globalising world.

"It is not simply enough to have that sufficient institutional capacity and financial means. We need to invest in ‘culture' – in the widest meaning of this term - to make it possible to get the appropriate matching of means on one hand and the best use of human capital on the other hand" said Van den Brande. "This will lead to further economic development, competitiveness and will contribute to the achievement of the Lisbon-goals as set out by the European Union" he added.

Encouraging the use of citizenship programmes to increase the participation and involvement of regions and cities, Commissioner Figel was keen to promote the role of local and regional authority in implementing EU policy in matters relating to the Lisbon objectives, and applauded the work of the CoR.

"The Committee gives local and regional authorities a voice in the EU and I know that local and regional authorities have a key role in implementing our policies, especially in the domains directly linked to the Lisbon strategy. I commend the efforts of the Committee to build an environment of regular and systematic cooperation with the associations of local and regional authorities. "