Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-06-20-Speech-3-201"
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"en.20070620.22.3-201"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, there are many reasons at present which make the report we are debating today highly important and topical.
As far as the funding sectors are concerned, we take the view that the economic aspect of the partnership must be directed towards social cohesion and sustainable economic development, not forgetting that overall monitoring and enhanced action in all sectors are needed if we are to achieve our objectives.
The question of funding for Palestine is an important part of our report and was the subject of increased interest on the part of our honourable friends. From 1994 to 2006 the Commission provided about EUR 2 300 million to the Palestinian people. Payments to Palestinian areas have been quite stable at between EUR 232 and 260 million from 2002 to 2005. In 2006 alone, EUR 700 million was provided, which is our record so far. As we know from the decision by the Quartet on 9 May 2006, we have the temporary international mechanism and the European Commission used this mechanism to deliver the sum of EUR 107.5 million to its three windows, one for emergencies, one for infrastructure and one for payments to the poorest, vulnerable social groups. Our committee has considered our relations with the Palestinian Authority and the best way of addressing requirements, both for political and economic aid to the Palestinian Authority per se and for channelling humanitarian aid and, in order to update the report, I have proposed two oral amendments, one to paragraph 38, which is now out of date and can be deleted or radically amended and one new paragraph referring to the Council decisions both on support for the new government and on the commitment through the international mechanism to take the action needed for humanitarian aid to Gaza. I wish to state that our political group supports our undertaking and I believe that I also have the support of the rest of the House on this new paragraph.
The poor results of the Euro-Mediterranean process and, at the same time, the huge challenges in this area are forcing us to take serious stock and adopt serious policies and financial commitments.
The tragic situation in the Palestinian territories is getting worse and developments are sounding the alarm for a deterioration in the situation and calling on us to take stock of our actions and become aware of our responsibilities for the future.
We also have to give convincing answers to the concerns of European citizens about the management of resources in areas which are lagging behind in democratic commitments and management and evaluation mechanisms.
I should like to remind the House that the MEDA programme is our principal financial instrument for the implementation of the Euro-Mediterranean partnership supporting measures for the political chapter and the economic chapter, in the aim of creating a free trade zone, and for the cultural and social chapter which forms the third pillar.
MEDA II, which is the most recent MEDA programme we have applied, was scheduled to provide the sum of EUR 5.3 billion from 2000 to 2006. The MEDA regulation came to an end in 2006 and today we have a new European Neighbourhood and Partnership Instrument which entered into effect in 2007 and we believe that our experience from MEDA will be very useful for the new instrument.
I should like to remind the House that annual commitments under MEDA ΙΙ, to which most of our report is devoted, varied between EUR 569 million in 2000 and EUR 697 million in 2004. In other words, there was a steady increase, although we need to bear in mind that between MEDA Ι and MEDA ΙΙ our commitments increased for Palestine, Syria, Algeria and Morocco and for the regional activities, but decreased for Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon and Tunisia. Similarly, increases varied according to implementation sector. There was a marked increase in funding for actions which include education, training and economic institutional support, while less funds were committed for other sectors, such as agriculture, local development and private reforms under MEDA IΙ than under MEDA Ι.
In light of our experience in the European Parliament and the information received and the report by the Court of Auditors, the Commission's management of the MEDA programme has clearly improved since the early years and we can say that, given the political circumstances that play their role in the area, the evaluation is satisfactory and a great deal of effort was made, gradually resulting in an even allocation of resources, with shorter preparation times and faster disbursement.
We might urge the European Commission to take account in future activities of the fact that there is a steady increase in the number of projects and programmes, that there is an even larger share of budget support in the total programme, that the role played by our offices and the apportionment of responsibilities at local level has been judged satisfactory and important and must be increased and that cooperation with the local authorities played a role and we must enhance this. We must also do whatever we can to enhance cooperation between the Mediterranean countries (South-South partners) in order to achieve the much sought-after objective of regional cooperation and integration."@en1
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