Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-10-04-Speech-3-244"
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"en.20001004.11.3-244"2
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".
I am very pleased that Mrs Torres Marques has asked this question because it gives me the opportunity to sum up, before the plenary session of the European Parliament, the situation with regard to Cohesion Fund commitment appropriations, which affects not only the country for which she is a Member but also other countries – Ireland, Greece and Spain. I would also like to state my concern at the very low level of commitment of Cohesion Fund appropriations at the end of August – only 16%, Mrs Torres Marques – and, while things have changed for the better since the end of August, I would like to reiterate this concern, which I shared with Parliament’s Committee on Regional Policy, Transport and Tourism on 11 September.
Meetings have been held with the Greek, Irish and Portuguese authorities to ask the governments of these countries to speed up their presentation to the Commission of their Cohesion Fund projects.
We have received a set of projects from Spain which give me cause to hope that, in the case of this country, there will be a complete implementation of appropriations for the year in progress, subject, of course, to these projects fulfilling the requirements in terms of technical expertise.
In the case of Portugal, Mrs Torres Marques, but above all in the case of Greece, the number of projects received does not give me the same cause to hope for a satisfactory implementation of appropriations. Please understand me when I say that I would not wish to be misunderstood in the slightest by you or any of the MEPs concerned. I do not want to point the finger or hand out good or bad marks. It is my responsibility to manage as rigorously and as actively as possible the European Union’s second largest budget, that for Regional Policy and the Cohesion Fund. I have to report not only to the Court of Auditors and to the tax-payers, but also, first and foremost, to the European Parliament, which is responsible for budgetary control and for adopting this budget, and I believe that it is my duty and role to say what is happening, at such times as I judge fit, and to do so in a transparent manner, with respect for the budgetary authority of which the European Parliament forms part.
There are reasons why so few projects have been submitted to the Commission to date. On the one hand, as a result of the efforts made to commit all the appropriations at the end of 1999, there was inevitably a very sharp drop in applications for the financing of new projects at the beginning of this financial year. On the other hand, as this is the first year of the new programming period, I have to say, and this is an objective assessment, that the Cohesion Fund countries, including your own, have centred their efforts on Objective 1 programming. I have, in fact, publicly stated, notably at Lisbon in the presence of the Prime Minister and Mrs Lisa Ferreira, that the Commission was extremely satisfied with the quality of the work carried out by the Portuguese authorities in conjunction with the local authorities as concerns Objective 1 programming.
However, due to the very major efforts made it has been impossible to make a simultaneous and commensurate effort in respect of the Cohesion Fund. I would like to say to the countries concerned that they now have to make this effort and swiftly present a sufficient number of tangible projects. Otherwise, there will be a risk of certain Cohesion Fund appropriations made for the financial year 2000 being lost for ever.
Indeed, contrary to the provisions of the interinstitutional agreement on the Structural Funds, no form of rebudgeting in subsequent financial years is provided for in the case of the Cohesion Fund. Those countries that are Cohesion Fund beneficiaries should therefore be under no illusion that there is little time left for projects to be submitted and appraised under the budget year in progress. That is the point that I wanted to make as clearly as possible, Mrs Torres Marques. Thank you for providing me with the possibility to do so."@en1
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