Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-09-27-Speech-2-142"
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"en.20050927.18.2-142"2
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"Mr President, unless I am misinformed, I have had Mr Galeote’s three minutes added to my speaking time, but I shall defer to the services’ judgment on that; in any case, I do not need all three of them, but I would be glad to lay claim to some of them.
It is indeed the case that economic, social and territorial cohesion make interconnection not only between the regional, state and European levels, but also between the Community’s various policy areas necessary. It is the regions, however, that will in future remain the appropriate territorial level for the implementation of cohesion policy, in line with the principles of subsidiarity and decentralisation.
It is with this in mind that both Parliament and the Commission have – and rightly – favoured explicit decentralisation and concentration along the lines of ‘one fund, one programme’, and so I am led to take what is actually an optimistic view of the next planning period.
I, of course, take a completely different view of Mr Guellec’s splendid own-initiative report from that of Mr Allister, who spoke before me, for Mr Guellec is right to emphasise territorial cohesion as one of the EU’s strategic goals in terms of the promotion of harmonious and balanced development throughout its territory. It is in this respect, as he also rightly points out, that the EU marks itself out as something more than just a free trade zone, and quite right too.
The eastward enlargement brought a new and significant dimension to the challenge of cohesion, as the EU had never before had to face such a marked increase in disparities. It is true to say that the new, enlarged EU is now characterised by a great deal of geographical and cultural diversity, and this is what distinguishes it from comparable major economic areas such as the USA, Japan or Mercosur.
As such diversity does, however, constitute one of the EU’s great growth factors, it needs to be maintained as European integration proceeds.
This means that the policies that affect the EU’s spatial and urban structure must promote its territorial continuity, without – let me emphasise – standardising local and regional identities, as these have a vital role to play in enriching the quality of life for the public as a whole.
If I may express this in more precise terms, the territory that now comes into being does not abolish national, regional or local areas. On the contrary, the object of spatial planning at European level is to make the best possible use of every specificity as a source of growth. The rapporteur is right to say that the EU does not as yet possess any competence for spatial planning, for no provision is made for it in the treaties, even though it is a thorny issue for the Member States.
I am persuaded that the reduction in the number of goals for the coming planning period will make the new regional cohesion policy more coherent. The new regional cohesion policy, with fewer targets to meet in the next planning period, must – and will – gain new dynamism in facing up to the challenges that await it, so that the objective of territorial cohesion, too, will be achieved, and, indeed, if need be, independently of the budget funding provided for regional and cohesion policy, which we still hope will be substantial enough to enable us to perform the tasks set us.
With this end in mind, we must, on the one hand, focus on the Community’s strategic guidelines for cohesion, while also taking territorial specificities into account, and, while I am on that subject, I have to say that I take a rather sceptical view of the rapporteur’s proposals, according to which, alongside GDP, new territorial criteria and indicators need to be created in order to evaluate a region’s development and the obstacles to it.
We have learned from previous planning periods that this is where we face the great risk of such additional criteria, when brought into play by one or other party, all too easily degenerating into a wish list that can no longer be objectively evaluated."@en1
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