Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-11-20-Speech-4-011"
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".
Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I should like to start by expressing both our satisfaction with the Commission proposal establishing the programme in question and our vindication, if I may say so, because efforts to provide the facility for funding for a variety of European women's organisations through the budget started with our political group. Thus, for us, the objective of the present programme must be the facility for the European Women's Lobby to continue its work and, at the same time, the facility for other women's organisations to function and develop integrated activities within the general framework of equality between men and women.
That is why we are calling in our amendments for funding to be directed not at special actions which cannot guarantee the permanence or standard of the programmes or the viability of organisations, but at funding operations, as is the case with the European Women's Lobby. Besides, we should not forget that special, specific actions, as proposed in the Commission draft, can be funded under other programmes or within the framework of Community policies with the annual priorities – equal pay, reconciling work and family life, participation in decision-making, changing stereotypes – every year there is this facility for women's organisations.
As far as the period of application of the programme is concerned, I share your opinion, Commissioner, that it should apply until 2006, precisely because we cannot forecast requirements as of now, especially once the new countries join. Besides, it is a pilot programme and we need to see how it progresses. We can continue to extend it after the evaluation.
As regards the application of the gradual 2.5% reduction after three years in application of the programme, I really cannot understand the logic of the rapporteurs who proposed this amendment. The European Commission expressly exempts all women's organisations in this programme from any such gradual reduction on the basis of the provisions of the Financial Regulation. Why should we apply it, especially to women's organisations other than the European Women's Lobby? Especially at a time when the European Women's Lobby has other priorities within the framework of funding. It is discriminatory treatment of the organisations which does not even stand up on the basis of the Regulation.
We also consider the proposal adopted by the Committee on Women's Rights and Equal Opportunities to differentiate the percentage of funding for women's organisations to be discriminatory treatment. We cannot ask for 90% cofinancing for one organisation, such as the Lobby, which has preferential treatment, as I have said, such as funding for operations without submitting invitations for expressions of interest, and to ask for 80% from other organisations which do not have permanent funding and are selected following invitations for expressions of interest.
As regards our amendments to do with transferring the European Women's Lobby from the articles to the Annex, this is for technical reasons at the Council's suggestion, precisely because we believe that we need to try to achieve a uniform format for all Community programmes which fund action by non-governmental organisations. And the precise aim of our amendments is to bring us closer to a final agreement.
We are trying, Commissioner, with our amendments, to keep to Community standards, precisely in order to speed up the immediate application of the programme, a programme which, however, does not limit the action of women's organisations to specific areas or specific groups or direct it to specific philosophies.
Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, society is developing. Standards are changing, women's aspirations are constantly becoming richer and broader. It is up to us to show that we are able to administer this variety and give our society and, more importantly, the job of women, the opportunity to express its pluralism."@en1
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