Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-10-03-Speech-2-151"
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"en.20001003.4.2-151"2
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"Mr President, enlargement is essential for the construction of a strong and united European continent. The economic and social cohesion laid down in the Treaty, the basis of the policy of European solidarity, must be one of the basic elements of that construction. However, we must not forget that, after enlargement and as a result of the low standard of living in the candidate countries, the average Community GDP is going to be reduced by at least 18%. The immediate consequence will be that more than 20 of the current Objective 1 regions will exceed the ceiling for receiving aid – 75% of the Community average – without having increased their income in real terms.
Ladies and gentlemen, we are not always able to clearly explain these pitfalls to our citizens nor propose clear and acceptable solutions.
Somebody said here today that enlargement is not a priority for 60% of the people consulted by the latest
. The report on the opinion of the Committee on Regional Policy, Transport and Tourism – of which I am rapporteur – has therefore had to play a dual role. Regional policy, the policy of European solidarity, is, of the common policies, the one which is most familiar to the citizens and one of the most valued. My report on the committee’s opinion therefore talks not only of what the candidate countries have to do but also of what the European Union has to do. The candidate countries must now embark on their own regional policy, develop the appropriate administrative structures, move ahead with the process of decentralisation and regionalisation, open up channels for participation to local and regional authorities and to social agents and create effective programmes of transnational and cross-border cooperation amongst themselves and with the Member States. They must do all of this because, after enlargement, we will not only have to combat the inequalities which those countries have inherited from the past, but also those which are being created at this very moment. This is not only a result of their internal policies, but above all because of our investments, European investments, or, if you prefer, Member States’ investments, which are accentuating the internal differences between the regions of those countries to the highest possible degree. That is why my report encourages them to create their own regional policy and move forward in this process.
My report is also bound to discuss the European Union and has to demonstrate that the European funds for regional development cannot continue to be granted on the basis of a simple distribution of money between regions or districts. If we do not establish priorities from a continent-wide perspective and straightaway, we will waste precious time, a few very important years in the task of constructing a strong and united continent. It is essential, ladies and gentlemen, to create a genuine European regional planning policy, of which the Structural Funds are a component, an element, but which gives rise to ambitious actions in favour of balanced and integrated development of the European area in its different dimensions. It is necessary to develop this European plan, link it clearly to regional policy and to the reform which is going to be implemented in 2006. We must begin to discuss this integrated and polycentric European development. The moment to move forward will perhaps arrive after the next Intergovernmental Conference. The European Parliament and its Committee on Regional Policy, which also has competence in the field of transport and the Trans-European Networks, is aware that it is necessary to coordinate the different Community sectoral policies in favour of a global policy of regional planning. The European Commission works on the basis of this same hypothesis and will put forward some of its proposals in the second triennial report on cohesion which it will present to Parliament in December. We know that this is perhaps not the ideal moment politically, but there is also a need to discuss the current financial perspectives negotiated at the Berlin European Council, which do not seem to us to be sufficient to confront the challenges of the regional policy and the economic and social cohesion of an enlarged European Union.
Ladies and gentlemen, cohesion and European citizenship are one and the same thing. Helmut Schmidt and Valéry Giscard d'Estaing put it another way: the only way we can create realistic and viable integration is through political will and socio-economic conditions which are almost identical."@en1
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"Eurobarometer"1
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