Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-02-14-Speech-3-411"
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"en.20070214.25.3-411"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner, we are currently discussing a draft European Parliament resolution concerning budget aid for developing countries. These are poor and backward countries where, in many cases, armed conflict or even full-scale war is taking place. Corruption is rife in these countries, and it would be a sick joke to speak of the rule of law, parliamentary democracy, respect for fundamental freedoms and human rights or political pluralism in this context. The only asset all these countries have in abundance is poverty.
We want to help them. Wealthy Europe has never been extravagant. It has always thought long and hard before parting with money. The resolution before us reflects this attitude. If the 20 principles and 29 recommendations were applied to the letter it would be impossible to spend a single cent.
We expect countries hoping to obtain aid to meet certain conditions. We all know what these conditions are, but I shall venture to recall some of them. Firstly, the initial condition for the award of budget aid is a properly functioning democracy. Secondly, for budget aid to be effective, the recipients and national structures must be efficient. They must be efficient not only in terms of a properly functioning democracy that respects fundamental freedoms, human rights and political pluralism, but also in terms of budget procedures, competent spending and the provision of services that will be the subject of control. In addition to this, aid may only be awarded in cases when the net benefit obtained thanks to that mechanism can be identified on the basis of clearly itemised criteria, and only following a detailed risk assessment.
As we establish these principles, we should recall what the President of the Palestinian Authority stated in this House a few months ago. He was writing on the subject of the worrying decision concerning the award of budget aid to Malawi and Kenya, for which all the Member States have suspended budget aid. This move then cast doubt on the European Commission’s ability to use such an instrument effectively. Let us remember that an annual amount of EUR 6 is allocated to each child at school in Nairobi. That child will receive one pencil a year, and will have to share a textbook with two other children. There are between 100 and 120 children in each class. Most of the people are also short of water, electricity and food, yet this is one of the most stable countries in Africa. The World Bank continues to provide it with aid, and the European Investment Bank has also recently begun to do so.
In this context, the statement that the European Parliament is concerned about the difficulties relating to assessing the degree to which effectiveness indicators have been met sounds rather strange. In particular, concern has been expressed concerning difficulties in assessing the impact on poverty. Parliament has urged the Commission to support efforts to foster developments in the compilation of statistics, data collection, quality assessment and analysis. I am firmly convinced that the principles presented here are appropriate for Germany, France and England, but certainly not for the countries we are concerned with. Therefore, I cannot understand the reason for this resolution and what it is meant to improve."@en1
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