Inquiry
6. The Committee launched its inquiry into the European
Social Fund on 13 February of this year. The deadline for submissions
was 2 April. We received 21 memoranda from individuals and organisations.
The list of appendices gives the details of those organisations
that have submitted evidence and the written evidence is published
with this report. The submissions fall into three distinct categories.
The first group includes various government bodies/agencies, including
DWP,[5] Learning and Skills
Council (LSC) (local and national) and some Government Offices
(GOs).[6] The second group
includes some support organisations for voluntary and community
(V&C) groups, many of which are involved in countering social
exclusion. The third group includes a few memoranda from individuals
who have particular complaints about rejection or late payment
of grant.
7. We heard oral evidence from representatives of
the European Commission, Learning and Skills Council, V&C
organisations and Government Offices (London and Yorkshire and
the Humber). We also took oral evidence from Chris Pond, Parliamentary
Under Secretary of State, Department for Work and Pensions. We
wish to record our thanks to all those individuals who helped
the Committee.
8. From the outset, we have been interested in investigating
the policy and management of the ESF, looking for examples of
good practice and opportunities for improvement and assessing
the implications for the UK after the end of the current programming
period in 2006. In terms of the background information on the
structural funds generally and the ESF in particular, much of
the written evidence, as expected, was descriptive and generally
non-controversial. However, a number of organisations, especially
project sponsors from the voluntary sector, expressed serious
reservations about the new system of co-financing that has been
introduced in England. The case for and against the system of
co-financing became one of the dominant themes of the written
evidence. We decided to concentrate on this aspect since it falls
within the responsibility of the DWP and hence the remit of this
Committee. It also has a bearing on a number of other concerns
about ESF, especially the role of the community and voluntary
sector organisations and the level of administration that organisations
are expected to shoulder. Throughout the inquiry we were keen
to focus on how ESF functions at the micro-level, especially the
way in which ESF projects are selected, managed, administered
and audited. We decided to visit a number of service providers
to see and hear at first hand what service providers themselves
felt about the ESF. We were pleased that a number of witnesses
provided helpful case studies illustrating their work.[7]
9. We have marshalled a great deal of evidence on
ESF.[8] However, we were
mindful that the mid-term evaluation would provide the most comprehensive
body of knowledge about the workings of the ESF in the UK and
throughout the EU.[9] However,
at the time of writing little is known about the results of the
evaluation. The UK Government is expected to publish its findings
later in the year and the Commission is expected to publish the
results from all EU member states sometime early in 2004.
10. We wish to record our thanks to those individuals
and organisations that generously shared their experience and
expertise with us. We hope that this report and the supporting
evidence will go some way to raising the profile of the ESF and
encouraging the sharing of best practice to the benefit of individuals
wishing to improve their access to the labour market.
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