Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-06-12-Speech-3-229"
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"en.20020612.5.3-229"2
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"Mr President, Commissioners, ladies and gentlemen, it has been pointed out several times today already, and I can only emphasise it, that the advantages of EU eastward enlargement naturally outweigh the disadvantages and that many will gain from it. But there are also problems and we cannot disregard those problems if, as Mr Walter has just said, we want to take the citizens with us.
That is particularly so at the interfaces of enlargement, that is the border regions. Many border regions are already marginal areas with large structural deficits. It is for that reason that we cannot leave those regions alone. That is why, among other things, we have Community action for border regions, which I consider to be a very good instrument. The main section relates to transport. As we also made clear in the Sommer report, we must give regional transport a central place in that. It is not enough only to invest in TENs, because it is not only about ways from Warsaw to Berlin or from Vienna to Prague, but it is also about ways from one small town over here to another small town over there.
This brings me to the second key area mentioned in this Community action, namely support for small and medium-sized enterprises. Cross-border trade is a necessary step. There is now a pilot scheme that has at last got going and I hope it will be a great success. But we will only be successful if we simplify the application procedures and if we get better coordination between support instruments, for example between Interreg and PHARE-CBC. I also want to stress here that we do not need any new instruments, but that we should optimise the existing ones.
Finally, we must also give some thought to whether we cannot increase the proportion of cofinancing in one corner or another. Instruments like Community Action really have European added value. In border regions, people come together. They may work on one side and live on the other. This is where they can get to know each other and learn from one another. That is why we should do all we can to assist this process."@en1
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