Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-12-17-Speech-2-159"
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"en.20021217.5.2-159"2
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"Mr President, as I have already had occasion to point out, the exercises in financial engineering that the current budgetary process has required have once again demonstrated the precariousness of the Community financial framework and, consequently, the need for it to be revised and adapted.
It is well known that the financial framework decided on in Berlin is clearly inadequate for dealing with the costs of enlargement, the increased requirements of economic and social cohesion and, at the same time, for responding to the new priorities arising in the meantime, particularly for internal and external policies. Revising the financial perspectives would therefore be the most appropriate course of action. Or, in the absence of such a revision, the legitimate and full use of all the budgetary prerogatives granted to the European Parliament under the Treaties could have constituted a lesser evil, thereby avoiding the games involving redistribution and cuts to which we have become accustomed, often at the expense of previously set priorities and objectives.
I am thinking, in particular, about one area that has suffered more than most: cooperation and development policy. In fact, under the current framework and in light of the new priorities that have arisen in the meantime – Kosovo, Afghanistan, as well as Palestine and the pre-accession funds for Turkey or even the Global Health Fund – compressing appropriations intended for the poorest countries has become an inevitability. This compression of funds is now being extended to food aid, to cooperation with Latin America, the Balkans and to the MEDA Programme. Nevertheless, as a result of all the advances, transfers, reserves and non-execution, not even the budgetary decisions adopted have been implemented. This is the case now of the EUR 55 million intended specifically for Afghanistan. We are also seeing an attempt to include the funding of the Global Health Fund within the European Development Fund without even consulting the target countries of the EDF and to their detriment. All of this is happening because the principle of sufficiency of means, according to which new priorities should be given new financial means, is not being observed. A revision of the upper ceiling for the financial perspectives was clearly needed under category 4, which concerns external policies.
The issue becomes even more clear and urgent, however, if we consider the fact that the volume of payment expenditure being proposed for adoption represents an increase in 2003 of only 1.9%, in other words, lower than the expected level of inflation, which will lead to a real reduction in the payments budget. As a matter of fact, this budget for 2003 will become, in relative terms, and in terms of the criteria of the Stability Pact, the lowest in the last decade, representing only 1.02% or less of Community GDP. It makes no sense to seek to achieve more and more Europe and at the same time, wish to adopt an increasingly low budget.
Having said this, I should like to add a positive note, with regard to East Timor. I welcome the results that have been achieved, both by maintaining a specific budget line, something for which I have always fought, and by increasing this line by EUR 6 million more than the Council proposal. This sends a positive political sign to a country and a population that gained independence only recently and which are still experiencing considerable difficulties and this brings together, as a matter of fact, the various decisions that we have adopted on this matter.
I wish lastly, to say a couple of words about Palestine: given the tragic situation currently facing that country, we must respond to the situation next year by establishing a line and sufficient appropriations, specifically to recuperate the investments that the European Union has made there."@en1
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