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1. The Network shall be governed by a Board. Member States shall nominate onto the Board one member and one alternate member, from the senior management of their respective PES. The Commission shall also appoint one member and one alternate member of the Board. Alternate members of the Board shall replace their members whenever necessary. EMCO shall nominate, from its members and in accordance with its Rules of Procedure, one representative who will have observer status on the Board, with the exception of the restricted sessions of the Board. The Board shall be able to meet in restricted sessions, with the participation of one member per Member State and one member from the Commission, except for agenda points concerning the annual work programme. The Rules of Procedure of the Board shall provide further detailed rules on the holding of restricted sessions.

2. The Board shall appoint a Chair and two Vice-Chairs from among its members nominated by a Member State. The Chair shall represent the Network. A Vice-Chair shall replace the Chair whenever necessary.

3. The Board shall adopt its Rules of Procedure by unanimous decision. Those Rules of Procedure shall contain, inter alia, the decision-making arrangements of the Board, and the provisions on the appointment and terms of office of the Chair and Vice-Chairs of the Board.

4. The Board shall adopt by majority decision:

(a) the annual work programme of the Network, including the setting up of working groups and the language arrangements of the meetings of the Network;

(b) the technical framework for the delivery of the benchmarking and mutual learning activities, as part of the annual work programme of the Network, including the benchlearning methodology on the basis of the benchmarking indicators as set out in the Annex to this Decision to compare PES performance, the context variables, the data delivery requirements, and the learning instruments of the integrated mutual learning programme;

(c) the annual report of the Network. That report shall be sent to the European Parliament and to the Council, and shall be published.

5. The Board shall be assisted by a Secretariat provided by and based within the Commission. The Secretariat, in cooperation with the Chair and the Vice-Chairs, shall prepare the Board meetings, the annual work programme and the annual report of the Network. The Secretariat shall closely cooperate with the EMCO Secretariat, in order to coordinate initiatives and step up cooperation between the Network and EMCO.