Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/1999-09-16-Speech-4-039"
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"en.19990916.2.4-039"2
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"Mr President, it is true of course that politics is the only profession in which it is possible to lose your virginity more than once! As a maiden vice-presidential speaker, I am in that position again in my life.
As the House is aware, the Member States agreed to set up the agency’s headquarters and general services in Thessaloniki. The Commission has entered a reservation against this decision. As far as the Commission is concerned, the establishment of the agency in Pristina is not a mere detail of its proposal. It is a basic requirement for the efficient management for the programmes and the achievement of the agency’s objectives.
Disputation which causes delay is obviously not acceptable in view of the need to find a rapid solution to the problem and the Commission is therefore open to a compromise which maintains those objectives of speed and effectiveness. The Commission has already sent a document to the Council presidency and to Parliament in which it proposes a clear functional division of the agency services and staff between Pristina and Thessaloniki, with all the operational services concentrated in Pristina and the agency’s director based there at its centre of operations.
Finally, I should like to thank Parliament on behalf of the Commission for its amendments. The new Commission will obviously study them closely. I emphasise, however, that the Commission and Parliament have the same objective: to maximise the speed and efficiency of the Commission’s efforts on the ground in Kosovo for the people of the region.
As a new Commission, we would like to take a short time to look at the situation and your amendments, in order to be as sure as we can be that we get things right. I am certain that the Council will wish to do the same.
It is essential to involve the people of Kosovo in the reconstruction process and to ensure effective coordination with non-governmental organisations. Budgetary transparency is clearly necessary, as Parliament proposes to draw a clear distinction between the contribution from the Community budget and contributions from other sources and to distinguish between expenditure on physical reconstruction and on institution-building.
Finally, Mr President, the Commission would be in favour of Parliament being consulted before any decision by the Council on extending the agency’s activities to other regions of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. That would enhance the role of Parliament, which already receives a quarterly report on the agency’s activities and has the important task of giving discharge to the agency’s director for the implementation of the budget.
I am sure that full advantage will be taken of the slight pause that it is generally agreed is needed if we are to achieve our objective of a speedy and efficient aid effort for the benefit of and with the assistance of the people of Kosovo.
In response to what has been a very high-quality debate, I am extremely pleased to be joined by my new colleague, the Budget Commissioner, Michaele Schreyer, whose presence is evidence of close interest in this issue and its financial and budgetary implications. It is extremely useful that Mrs Schreyer has been here today.
I would like to thank very much the rapporteurs and members of the various committees who have given such thorough and urgent attention to the crucial issue that is before the House now. I would also like to thank them for the quality of their contributions and the commitment they have shown in offering their opinions and submitting the report by Mrs Pack.
As the House will know, the Commission proposal essentially concerns the setting-up of an agency to implement the Community’s reconstruction programmes, initially in Kosovo but later, when circumstances allow, in other regions of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia like Serbia and Montenegro. Clearly the agency’s mandate does not cover assistance in the other countries of former Yugoslavia or other Balkan countries because this structure is the specific European Union instrument for the reconstruction of Kosovo. It is designed to maintain the European Union’s necessary control over the reconstruction programme and to safeguard its independence and right of initiative in the process. The agency’s work must be clearly associated with the European Union and not diluted in the broader activities of the numerous bodies that are dealing with Kosovo and the region. That is not for any reason of insularity; a clear division of tasks is essential in order to ensure proper accountability.
The Commission’s proposal reflects the need to set up an instrument for the rapid, decentralised and efficient management of reconstruction aid in a way that takes account of the urgency of the situation and the exceptional efforts that are required. Honourable Members repeatedly have drawn attention to those realities in this debate and indeed on many other occasions. The Commission’s initiative takes past experience into account and, in particular, the difficulties encountered in the first phase of reconstruction in Bosnia which, as the House has rightly recalled again this morning, led to delays in implementing those programmes. The Commission’s proposal to set up a European Agency for reconstruction is largely based on Parliament’s recommendations on reconstruction in Bosnia - recommendations which rightly underline the need to decentralise the management of aid by increasing local staff numbers and to provide for mechanisms that are better adapted to the urgency of the reconstruction requirements.
I would like to make particular reference to certain aspects of the Commission proposal relating to the agency’s structure. Following the request to set up an agency made by the Cologne European Council, the Commission’s proposal is largely based on the model of all other existing European agencies: a structure with its own legal personality and decision-making powers and with the Member States represented on a governing board. Such a structure will enable reconstruction to be managed by means of specially adapted procedures which are unlike those used in the Commission’s departments. It will enable staff to be recruited specifically for the requirements of reconstruction and for a period of time, as Mr Bourlanges sought, that is limited to the tasks in hand. The agency will employ staff in ways that are subject to statutory provisions for carrying out public service tasks which the technical assistance office should not and cannot take on.
As is the case with all other existing Community agencies, the Commission proposes that Member States be represented on the governing board so that their presence ensures full coordination of the European Union’s activities with those carried out in the field by Member States. It could encourage Member States to use the agency to implement their own programmes. Furthermore, the participation of Member States in the governing board will make it possible to ensure that once the annual programme is decided by the Commission, all the rest of the decisions related to projects will be taken on the ground without referring back to the management committee composed of Member States in Brussels. Regardless of the proposed competences of the agency, I would like to make it quite clear that the Commission will continue to exercise its powers and fully assume its responsibilities. The agency will not be empowered to determine policy guidelines or to approve the reconstruction programmes. It is the Commission that will take, and will be accountable for, the decisions on the programmes to be carried out by the agency.
Mr President, the location of the agency’s headquarters, as this morning’s discussions again made evident, has led to some controversy in the Council as well as in this House. The function of the agency is to ensure efficiency and speed in the management of aid. That involves decentralising management and establishing effective cooperation with other operators from the international community in Kosovo. Pristina has, therefore, been chosen by the Commission as the location for the agency’s headquarters. That is where the provisional administration of Kosovo is based and all the agencies and organisations responsible for reconstruction in the region are located. It is Kosovo that is to be reconstructed.
Logically, therefore, the agency should have its operational base there, although in arguing for that option, everyone will, I am sure, bear in mind the very persuasive points that Mr Cohn-Bendit made in today's debate about previous experience."@en1
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