FNF 2023 Participant information

Do you have a question that is not answered here? Please let us know at contact@freedomnotfear.org

Freedom not Fear 2023
1–4 September (Friday–Monday)
Mundo Madou (Fri–Sun) · European Parliament (Mon)

Locations

  • Venue: Mundo Madou, Avenue des Arts 7-8, 1210 Brussels
  • Hotel: Adagio Access Brussels Europe, 12 rue de l’Industrie, Brussels (OpenStreetMap)
  • European Parliament (EP): 60 rue Wiertz / Wiertzstraat 60, Brussels (OpenStreetMap)
  • Parlamentarium: Esplanade Solidarność 1980, Rue Wiertz / Wiertzstraat 60, Brussels

Participation – Do I need to register?

The event is open for all and no registration is needed, if you just want to take part Friday to Sunday. We would appreciate, if you could still let us know when you’ll be there in order to plan lunch and other capacities.

If you want to take part in the EP visit on Monday and apply for any reimbursements, you do have to register, see below.

Option 1: Participation Fr-Sun, no EP visit, no (travel) allowance:
Freedom not Fear 2023 is self-organised and free, you do not need to register to take part in the conference at Mundo Madou from Friday to Sunday evening.

However, if you would like to take part at your own expenses, not joining for the EP visit but want to book hotel accommodation with us, you may still register, notifying us that you won’t join the EP visit.

If you will take part but don’t register, please e-mail us at contact@freedomnotfear.org to let us know when you are planning to come, so we can plan for food and venue capacity.

Option 2: Participation whole event, EP visit & (travel) allowance:
By registering you benefit from a reimbursement of (some) travel expenses (see “Travel reimbursement”) and optional affordable accommodation arranged by us. For any allowance you MUST take part in the official EP visit on Monday, 4 September 20233. No show = no money.

EDIT: Please note: The registration is closed, there are no more places available.
Nevertheless it is still possible to participate in fnf in a selforganized way. You could book your own EP visit and/or request a meeting with an MEP on your own account.  If you do so, please inform us about your plans and expected participation.

Registration fee & expenses

We are asking for a registration fee of 50 € for the expenses we need to cover in in advance, such as venue hire, hotel booking and catering. During the event we will kindly request your donation for lunches and our joint dinner on Saturday evening as well as donations to support organisational expenses. However, we will not charge anything, contributions are highly appreciated but voluntarily. After the event you may receive a reimbursement of your actual travel expenses up to an amount as defined below plus an allowance of up to 100 €, see below for conditions.

Travel & Reimbursement

As soon as you have registered and received a confirmation from us, you should book your travel in order to secure tickets. We recommend to book refundable tickets, since there is no reimbursement of expenses for cancelled travel. Make sure to always keep tickets, receipts and boarding passes, which we need to claim reimbursement.

Please also consider environmental issues – if traveling by plane is only little cheaper than bus/train, and you are willing to invest some more time, travel by land could be the better option. It is also possible to combine different means of transportation. When planning your departure, please keep in mind that we will try to schedule meetings on Monday afternoon (after the mandatory EP & Parlamentarium visit until 14:00h!) with MEPs and other policy makers until about 15:00h.

Travel reimbursement

People who have registered are eligible for reimbursement of (some of) their actual travel expenses after having taken part in the official visit to the European Parliament and Parlamentarium. Make sure to keep all tickets and receipts (travel, accommodation, food, local transport etc.) since we need the original tickets for reimbursement. The maximum reimbursement for your travel expenses is 0.09 € per km travel* from your EU-residence to Brussels and back plus an accommodation & food allowance of up to 100 €, if desired (see “Accommodation”). You can expect to receive the allowance within a month after FNF.

* ( 0.09 €/km travel forth and back = 0.18 € per km distance between your residence and the EP in Brussels as pre-calculated by the EP according to google maps)

Accommodation

We arranged some rooms in Hotel Adagio close to the venue, which is relatively affordable for this area. You can book a single or double/twin room when registering for the event or register without accommodation and arrange your own accommodation instead. If you book a double/twin room, you can either provide a name of a person you would like to share a room with or we chose a room-mate for you.
Registered participants who take part in the EP visit are eligible for an accommodation and food allowance of up to 100 €, so please keep all receipts for any food, accommodation, (local) travel. You can decide to claim the full amount or donate any part of it to cover FNF organisational costs.

Who can take part / receive support

The FNF (un)conference on Friday, Saturday and Sunday is open for everyone. However, since we are focusing on EU policy and meeting your MEPs, our main target group is EU citizens.
To take part in the official EP visit, and receive allowances, you must be a citizen of an EU member state, a former EU member state or an EU candidate country. For the application you need to provide name, complete private address, nationality and date of birth.
If you are not a citizen of a current or former EU member state or an EU candidate country, but live in a current or former EU member state or an EU candidate country, please contact us BEFORE registering, because we would need to hand in your relevant residence permits for approval.
People who are a resident in a third country cannot benefit from financial support by the EP. If you reside in a neighbouring EU country, please contact us BEFORE registering, because we would need to apply for an exemption (derogation) at the MEPs’ office.

Catering / Food

There will be no breakfast and no dinner organised at the venue. If you’re booking accommodation with us, you can order breakfast extra in the form.

LUNCH: Vegetarian/vegan lunch will be provided at the venue – if you are not registered, please e-mail us to say on which days you will attend lunch to help us estimate the number of people we should expect: contact@freedomnotfear.org

Expenses for the lunch are about 12€ per person, please chip in as much as you can to cover the costs, since we are self-funded.

Saturday evening, 2 Sep 2022, 19-22h, we are organising a joint FNF-networking-dinner for all participants and affiliates from around Brussels at a different venue, about 30min walk from Mundo Madou. Please sign up and pay (recommended donation: 12€) for it when checking in at fnf – places are limited.

Visiting the European Parliament

The visit to the EP on Monday will include a meeting with the MEPs who invited us, a visit to the Plenary and a visit to the Parlamentarium (new requirement for the sponsored MEP visit since this year).

Make sure to bring your valid passport/ID to the visit.
The EP is wheelchair-accessible – if you have any needs for support, please let us know in advance.

Programme & Content

There will be a call for session proposals and a pre-liminary programme will be compiled from all session proposals we get submitted.
It will still be possible to propose sessions spontaneously at the event.

The rough schedule is:

Friday, 1 Sep 2023, 18:00: Arrival, 19:00h Opening, keynote and discussion
Saturday and Sunday, 2/3 Sep 2023: Your sessions
Saturday night: networking-dinner for those who want
Monday, 4 Sep 2023, 8:30 until 14:00: visit to EP and Parlamentarium, meeting with MEPs, Commission staff and other EU policy makers.

Language

The main language of communication and workshops will be English. However, it is possible to also offer workshops or sessions in other languages. If someone is not comfortable communicating in English at the event, please support each other with translations.

Covid policy

There are no official restrictions in place. At the event we encourage everyone to be conscious of your own behaviour and respect needs for distance or other safety measures of people around you.

How is FNF organised?

Freedom not Fear is traditionally organised by a group of committed volunteers with support from last year’s organisers and administrative support from Digitalcourage in Bielefeld, Germany. The organising team is newly set up every year and starts preparing the event around February. Looking for an adequate venue, booking accommodation, contacting MEPs and dealing with a lot of EP administration and communication is part of the tasks as well as calculating a budget, looking for donations and funding, writing texts, setting up forms, advertising the event and communicating with participants. Interested to join the organising team or donate for the event? E-mail us at contact@freedomnotfear.org.

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