Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-10-25-Speech-2-329"
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Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, on 14 July 2004, the Commission adopted a proposal for a regulation determining the general rules for the granting of Community financial aid in the field of the trans-European transport networks and energy for 2007-2013. Mr Mauro, your rapporteur, put in a great deal of effort on this text and I am grateful to him for that.
The first objective: simplification, to ensure more effective decision-making.
The second objective: conditionality, whereby the granting of aid will be conditional upon compliance with the principles of the common transport and energy policy. The Commission is proposing that precedence be given to the most environmentally friendly means of transport, such as rail transport, in particular freight, and that emphasis be placed on safety and security. Financing will also be dependent on whether the continuity and interoperability of the network can be guaranteed.
The third objective: in order to increase the leverage effect of Community funding for transport, the entire budget will be focused on just two groups of projects representing the cornerstones of the trans-European network. The first such group is the priority projects, among which special attention will be paid to those projects which contribute to the integration of the internal market in an enlarged Community, such as cross-border sections, and those which make a major contribution towards reducing imbalances between methods of transport. The second group is the other projects of common interest, such as projects which help to enhance the quality of services provided on the network, improve safety and security for users and promote interoperability.
In the energy field, finally, funding will be focused mainly on the priority projects identified in the guidelines decision.
I should like to stress the point that, in the field of transport, the Commission is proposing higher maximum rates of aid. For some sections of the priority transport projects, the new regulation proposes to raise the maximum cofinancing rate to 30%, and for cross-border sections that maximum rate may rise to 50% in exceptional cases.
In the energy sector there is no change. Support for studies could reach 50% of eligible costs, whereas the rate applicable to construction is normally limited to 10% of eligible costs. In exceptional cases, such as priority projects, this figure could rise to 20%. In return for this higher rate of Community aid, the Member States must naturally provide solid guarantees on the basis of a financial plan and firm commitments as to the completion dates for the project.
I should also like to point out that the Commission is proposing the introduction of a new kind of aid, namely the creation of a guarantee instrument covering the specific risks inherent in TEN projects in the first years of operation post-construction. The purpose of this new instrument is to provide leverage for the financing of TEN projects by the private sector.
The proposal on which Mr Mauro worked was an ambitious project aimed at improving the trans-European network. This is a key factor in fulfilling the goals of the Lisbon Strategy, and we must ensure that we have the means at our disposal to achieve this. Mr Mauro has taken this aspect on board and I am grateful to him for that. I should just like to add one comment. I have learnt, Mr President, that in the context of the 2006 budgetary procedure your Committee on Budgets did not adopt the amendment tabled by the Committee on Transport and Tourism aimed at increasing the TEN-T budgetary line from EUR 120 million using the margin of heading 3. An appropriation of this nature for 2006 would have facilitated a smoother transition to the new financial perspective period.
That being said, it is my fervent wish, Mr President, that Parliament will adopt Mr Mauro’s conclusions. I believe, ladies and gentlemen, that, if we are really to derive maximum benefit from the single European market, then these trans-European networks, these great corridors running from North to South and from East to West, will play a vital role. They will facilitate freight movement and will provide the public with the opportunities for mobility and the scope for trade that they wish for.
This, Mr President, is why I feel that this proposal for a regulation is highly significant and why I shall be listening with interest to the various comments from the Members of Parliament who wish to speak on the matter.
As long ago as 2001, the Commission’s White Paper on the common transport policy sounded alarm bells regarding delays in the completion of the trans-European network (TEN). At the current rate of investment, it would take a further 20 years to complete the whole TEN, as revised in 2004. Let us be clear on this. No economy can be competitive without effective transport and energy networks. The establishment and smooth running of these networks represent essential prerequisites for the success of the internal market, for guaranteed sustainable mobility and for the security of energy supply in the enlarged Union.
Five years on from the Lisbon objectives, it is clear that the network continues to face strong, but uneven, traffic growth, which reinforces the need for sustainable development, and the need to integrate the transport and energy networks of the new Member States has become a pressing priority.
We must not underplay the role that Europe should play in developing these networks. The added value of our support can be seen in terms of the stability of financing over time, which many national budgets, subject to the vagaries of the economic climate, are incapable of offering. Most importantly, we can produce a leverage effect, whereby we encourage Member States to invest in projects with significant European added value, such as cross-border projects, and to work more closely together.
Our proposal to you for the new programming period is to allocate EUR 20.69 billion to the trans-European transport and energy networks, which will break down as EUR 20.35 billion for transport and EUR 340 million for the energy sector.
I should like to thank Parliament for lending its backing to the figure of EUR 20 billion that we proposed in the context of the financial perspective. That figure is crucial, and a bare minimum in light of what is at stake and what needs to be done. The financial requirements of the 30 priority projects identified by Parliament and the Council in 2004 alone account for EUR 225 billion, the lion’s share of which – some EUR 140 billion – falls in the period 2007 to 2013.
The funding applications that the Commission has received since 2001 demonstrate that the existing mature projects could absorb the currently available budget four times over. With regard to the energy field, the proposed budget increase is aimed, primarily, at addressing the needs of the ten new Member States. According to our estimates, the EUR 340 million that we are seeking amounts to just 1.7% of the cost of the priority projects. These projects are geared directly towards increasing our security of supply, at a time when we are becoming increasingly dependent on external suppliers, not least for natural gas.
All of this leads to the conclusion that the Commission’s initial proposal must be maintained. I am counting on Parliament not to cut the trans-European Energy network’s budget from EUR 340 million, as the report proposes, to a lower amount than was made available for 2000-2006.
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, beyond simple budgetary considerations, there are four additional objectives in the proposal before us this evening."@en1
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