Examination of Witnesses (Questions 60
- 69)
TUESDAY 4 JULY 2000
THE RT
HON CLARE
SHORT MP AND
MR ANTHONY
SMITH
60. Yes?
(Mr Smith) It is agreed it should happen.
61. It is agreed.
(Clare Short) I have to say logically, why do you
need a Quality Unit to vet what is put forward, why can you not
get quality put forward in the first place? On budgetisation of
the EDF, I asked the Department fairly early on to do me an analysis
on this and a very good note was done which I think I would like
to share with the Committee. My crude conclusion is that there
just is not a political majority for it, it is not going to happen.
To be honest, I have sort of put it out of my mind because it
is not a feasible thing that we are going to have to take a decision
about. I no longer command the details in my mind. There are theoretical
arguments for it because the EDF replenishment has to happen separately
around the renegotiations of Lome« but, of course, under
the new agreement it will not be like that. I am not in favour
of any change that gives more authority to the mainstream when
the mainstream is operating so badly. I do not have that kind
of long term ideological position. I have genuinely forgotten
a lot of the detailed argument because it is not a practical proposition
at the moment. A number of Member States were against it. I think
it was a very good note, I remember it. Do you remember, Rosemary
Stevenson prepared it? I would like to make it available to you.
62. Thank you very much.
(Clare Short) Do you want to add to that?
(Mr Smith) This was discussed during the renegotiation
of the Lome« Convention among the Member States and the Commission.
There were essentially two opposing views. One was led by France
which favoured budgetisation because essentially France would
pay less. Their contribution to EDF is above the level of contribution
they would make through the budget. The opposition was led, in
fact they were isolated at the end, by Spain but they held out
and did not agree to a reference to possible budgetisation in
some of the conclusions because Spain would pay more. The Secretary
of State, when we discussed this at that time, made some of the
points she has just made. If there is a logic to putting all of
your money in a single pot if it works effectively so you get
better coherence between programmes in Africa and other ACP countries
and the rest of the world then doing it now makes sense.
63. Yes.
(Clare Short) I think the long term argument is very
strong. The practicality is we are a long way from it.
64. We have also the worry of it being diverted
away from the poor.
(Clare Short) Absolutely.
Chairman: We would love to see the paper if
you could let us have it. Now, Andrew Rowe has been extremely
patient and I know he wanted to come in earlier.
Mr Rowe
65. There is talk of ruling out the backlog,
wiping it off, which leads me to think about the fact that we
never really seemed to consider the costs incurred by NGOs and
other practitioners in actually submitting proposals for EU money.
I just wondered how practical it would be, for example, to say
that if through no fault of the applicant a proposal either gets
aborted or something just goes wrong in some way, there should
be some form of compensation because really a lot of organisations
are ceasing to apply for EU funding simply because they cannot
afford to take the risk and involve all the costs of doing it.
(Clare Short) I think that failure to pay, and we
have lots of trouble with the British Consultants Bureau and people
being commissioned to do things and they do not get paid, is a
disgracefully bad administration. We had to intervene on behalf
of people whose organisations were going to go bankrupt so they
could pay their mortgages just because things that they had been
commissioned to do were not paid, and that is unforgivable. But
I have to say I think for the Commission to fund very small NGOs
from all the Member States for these small programmes is a nonsense.
There is too much of that in my view. It is an example, Ann, where
Parliament quite reasonably said "Let us have an NGO budget
line, we want to fund NGOs, NGOs are good things". A tiny
NGO in Greece or a tiny NGO in Scotland could apply to its own
country but goes on through this very slow bureaucracy, I think
that is a nonsense. I think it is another area where we should
say "Let Member States fund certain kinds of things and where
there is some cross-cutting element or whatever let the EC fund
it, let them do it better and do it faster". Personally I
am disappointed with the very powerful alliance of NGOs involved
in development across the European Union that I would expect and
want and try to engage with to be appointed for reform, but they
are not. I think that is largely because they are all tangled
up in making applications. I think we need to look at this, we
need to make it more efficient, but I think again we should say
"What should NGOs be applying to their own Member States
for? What is distinctive about the EU which makes it worthwhile
taking an application all the way to Brussels?" and then
make the whole thing more efficient. If there is some system of
penalty if you fail to fund when you have been offered, that seems
to me a reasonable proposition. I do not know quite what it would
entail but it is reasonable.
Ann Clwyd
66. We have had a number of complaints from
NGOs about delays in funding. Population Concern, for example,
mentioned two cases where delays in funding for two projects meant
that in one case the Director of a local NGO had to take out a
bank loan using her house as collateral to pay staff salaries.
Do you think Commission proposals will do something about that
ridiculous situation?
(Clare Short) I presume this is linked to the 40 signatures
to change the contract problem? It is outrageous and disgraceful
that the EC bureaucracy in our area of development is famous for
it. I do not know if there are any detailed proposals to deal
with this?
(Mr Smith) There have been particular problems with
funding the NGO line and people have been in touch with our NGO
Department, Civil Society Department, to look at that. I think
additional to the other problems that have been described there
has been a change of personnel which is trying to improve things
but it has simply been incredibly inefficient in dealing with
applications. There is a huge backlog of applications which are
just not dealt with. Clearly if contracts have been signed and
commitments made and then delivery does not follow, those are
the types of cases which in the past we have taken up with the
Commission. Where it is simply applications not being dealt with
and not getting to the decision point, again we can push them,
but they do not have a legal obligation yet.
(Clare Short) Maybe we should take this up, Anthony,
and talk about it because if they could agree to concentrate where
they will fund, and say no more quickly where there is no hope.
We do intervene on behalf of NGOs and others where they are already
committed, they are already working and they do not get paid.
That is an absolute outrage and it is far too common. It is to
do with gross inefficiencies.
67. We heard from EUROSTEP that no contracts
have been signed for NGO co-financing in the first months of this
year. Do you know the reason for that?
(Mr Smith) Partly what I have just been referring
to, simple inefficiency within that unit. There is a relatively
new person in charge, Tim Clarke, and I think he is trying to
get to grips with it.
68. You sound a bit sceptical?
(Clare Short) I think personally we have to restrict
what NGOs apply to the Commission for and then make them more
efficient at handling those. I know people put applications in
to their own country or other countries and then the Commission
of course is putting in and the whole system is grinding to a
halt which is no good for anybody.
Chairman
69. Well, I think that is a disappointing note
to end on but I think it is the right note. We have all got to
get a better European Commission and European Development Programme
if we can. We have to go on proceeding. Thank you very much indeed,
Secretary of State, and Anthony Smith, for spending time with
us this morning. We hope we shall be able to progress what is
obviously a common trend.
(Clare Short) Thank you. Can I just repeat,
the previous two reports of the Committee on EC matters were influential,
so thank you for this. It is important we get more and more people
interested in a reform agenda. We have made some progress but
we need to make more.
Chairman: Thank you very much indeed.
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