Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2009-02-18-Speech-3-265"
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"en.20090218.25.3-265"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner, I would first of all like to point out that unanimity was achieved in the ITRE Committee regarding this report. Unanimity was possible thanks to the good work and cooperation of the shadow rapporteurs, whose contributions also largely helped to achieve a useful report on a subject as important as the European research infrastructure.
To conclude, I would once again like to thank all the shadow rapporteurs, the Commission for their excellent contribution, and also the services of the ITRE Committee for the help that they have given me in drawing up this report.
I must say that Parliament agrees with the Commission that, in view of the globalisation of research and the emergence of new scientific and technological powers such as China and India, we urgently need to speed up, and, to that end, incentivise, the construction of a new European research area.
It is very important that we ensure as soon as possible that the European Union is an area in which researchers, technologies and knowledge can move freely, where there is effective coordination of research activities and where the best possible use is made of resources. This requires, amongst other things, that we have large research infrastructures at the European level.
These infrastructures can also provide an excellent opportunity for cooperation between the different Member States, with significant effects on the scientific education of our young people and a strong economic impact on European industry. They are therefore essential to the progress of science in Europe and consequently, we must facilitate their development. Parliament therefore applauds the Commission’s initiative in proposing a legal framework and the conditions for it.
In fact, from the beginning, we considered the development of European research infrastructures to be one of the pillars of the European Research Area. However, we were always aware of the difficulties that needed to be overcome, not only because they required significant financial resources – it should be remembered that the ESFRI roadmap identifies 44 projects that should be implemented in the next ten years – but also due to the technical and organisational complexity of the issue.
On this point I would like to say once again that in an initiative of this calibre, Parliament should have played a much more decisive role. However, the urgency of these measures and the absence of a better legal basis in the current Treaty sufficiently justify the use of Article 171, which does not take away from the fact that this is one more reason to proclaim the need to have a new Treaty as soon as possible.
I will briefly point out some of the contributions that the report makes. Firstly, it clarifies the definition of ‘European research infrastructure’ in order to avoid confusions between the legal entity and the actual research infrastructure. It also clarifies and completes the requirements for a piece of research infrastructure to be considered European, adding important issues such as an impact assessment for the proposal at the European level, justifying its financing capacity and ensuring that there is a good policy of access to the whole European scientific community.
We also propose extending this initiative to existing infrastructure, and we give our full support to the Commission’s proposal for exemption from VAT, which we think is the key element of this initiative.
We therefore want to send a clear message to the Council to resolve its problems on this issue as soon as possible and to say once again that if we want to promote research in Europe, we must release it from tax burdens. This is something that we have recommended on several occasions in order to encourage SMEs to participate in R&D tasks, and which we now need to support in relation with the creation of large research infrastructures at European level, because they are essential for the progress of science."@en1
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