Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-09-27-Speech-2-143"
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"en.20050927.18.2-143"2
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"Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I should like to begin by congratulating my friend, Mr Marques, on his excellent report and to thank him for being amenable to incorporating contributions made by other Members of this House. I should also like to congratulate Mr Guellec on the quality of his report.
As shadow rapporteur in the Committee on Regional Development, I tabled a number of amendments, most of which were adopted, and proposed that my political group support the report and most of the amendments tabled in the vote, both in committee and now in plenary. Despite our different perspectives and approaches, we came together in support of, firstly, the strategy proposed by the Commission for the sustainable development of the EU’s outermost regions, as regards the priorities, the instruments and, most importantly, the setting up of a specific programme to offset the additional costs relating to the specific, permanent constraints suffered by the outermost regions, such as remoteness, insularity, small size, difficult topography and climate, economic dependence on a few products and activities and the limited scope of local markets, and, secondly, the establishment of an action plan for the wider neighbourhood.
Although we were in favour of the strategy, we offered a number of criticisms or reservations, relating to the following areas: firstly, the absence of measures and financial resources to follow up the Commission’s statements and proposals; secondly, the use of per capita GDP as the sole criteria for these regions to qualify for the new ‘Convergence’ objective of the revamped cohesion policy; thirdly, the use of population criteria for the distribution of budgetary appropriations set out for the specific programme to compensate for additional costs; and fourthly, uncertainty over the action plan for the wider neighbourhood, given that it is unclear how this will fit in to the future ‘European territorial cooperation’ objective of the revamped cohesion policy and of the relevant ‘New Neighbourhood Policy’.
Consequently, in line with the view expressed by the rapporteur, I would suggest that the outermost regions deserve to be treated as a special case in view of their specific constraints, under Article 299(2), regarding the conditions for access to the Structural Funds, whereby priority financial support should be given to them, irrespective of their income level.
I would also advocate an increase in budgetary appropriations relating to the specific programme to be redistributed fairly on the basis of the constraints affecting them. Furthermore, the action plan for a wider neighbourhood should be clarified within the framework of the future ‘European territorial cooperation’ objective and the Union’s new ‘Neighbourhood Policy’. The concept of neighbourhood should encompass both neighbouring regions and countries such as Morocco, Cape Verde and Brazil, and countries hosting large communities of immigrants from the outermost regions that retain strong traditional ties.
I therefore support the adoption of this report, Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, as it represents a further step in the right direction in response to the Commission’s welcome proposal. In this way, once the financial perspective has been adopted, the conditions will be in place for the sustainable development of the outermost regions, and the successful promotion of economic, social and territorial cohesion."@en1
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