Flemish Community - Legal Authority

Legal Authority

Under the Belgian constitution, the Flemish Community has legal responsibility for the following:

• education (except for degree requirements, and for more than 95% of its financing);
• culture and language matters (except for all its economic aspects, which belong to the federal or to the regional level);
• certain aspects of health care (a minor part of the entire public health policy);
• international development cooperation in all areas of the competency of the Community (not yet operational).

As the Flemish Community's institutions (parliament, government and ministry) absorbed all competencies of the Flemish region, they became also competent for the following areas:

• agriculture (although the bulk of this policy is determined by the European Union);
• public works and regional economic development;
• energy (although nuclear energy remains on the federal level).

Members of the Flemish Parliament who were elected in Brussels region, have no right to vote on Flemish regional affairs. They can only vote on community affairs, since affairs concerning their region are governed by the Brussels Parliament.

Legally speaking, in the regions of Brussel-Capital as well as of Flanders, the Flemish Community is responsible not for individual people, but for Flemish institutions such as schools, theatres, libraries and museums. The reason for this is that no distinct sub-national status exists in Belgium.