Select Committee on European Scrutiny Third Report


5 Promotion of "active European citizenship"

(24682)

10898/03

COM(03) 276

Draft Council Decision establishing a Community action programme to promote active European citizenship.

Legal baseArticle 308 EC; consultation; unanimity
DepartmentHome Office
Basis of considerationMinister's letters of 11 November, 10 December and 15 December 2003
Previous Committee ReportHC 63-xxxiii (2002-03), paragraph 17 (15 October 2003)
To be discussed in Council22 December 2003
Committee's assessmentLegally and politically important
Committee's decisionNot cleared; further information requested

Background

5.1 The purpose of this draft Decision is to provide a legal base for grants, from the beginning of 2004, towards the promotion of active European citizenship. In the past, grants for this purpose have been financed under appropriations from Part A of the Commission section of the budget. The provision of a legal base for the grants is now required by the Financial Regulation of 2002[11] and the decision to apply activity-based budgeting to the Commission budget.

5.2 For several years, financial support for the promotion of active European citizenship has been provided under Part A to the following bodies:

  • the Association of the Councils of State and Supreme Administrative Jurisdictions of the European Union (the Association's purpose is to coordinate and relay to the public the judicial decisions of the Councils of State on Community law and to facilitate the pooling of methods of transposing and implementing European law at national level);
  • the "Our Europe" Association (described by the Commission as "a think tank of personalities representative of European society and the political, social, economic and scientific worlds to act as a marketplace for ideas promoting a closer European Union");
  • other European think tanks and organisations advancing the idea of Europe;
  • associations and federations of European interest;
  • the European Council on Refugees and Exiles (the Council represents organisations of refugees and displaced persons and promotes policies which contribute to the Treaty's objectives on asylum and social exclusion);
  • Jean Monnet House and Robert Schuman House (meeting places for the discussion and explanation of the activities of these two founding fathers of the European Union); and
  • bodies promoting town-twinning schemes in the European Union.

5.3 Under Part B of the Commission budget grants have been given to non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and trade union organisations to finance "measures for civil society" and to the Platform of European Social NGOs which, among other things, helps to shape EU policies on matters such as social rights.

5.4 The draft Decision provides for two types of grant:

a)  operating grants to co-finance expenditure associated with the permanent work programme of a body (such as the Association of Councils of State) pursuing an aim of general European interest in the field of active European citizenship or an objective forming part of the European Union's policy in that field; or

b)   grants to co-finance a specific action in the field of active European citizenship (such as the promotion by local authorities of town-twinning).

5.5 The proposal requires the Commission to submit, before the end of 2007, a report on the effectiveness of the programme in achieving its objectives.

5.6 When we considered the proposal in October,[12] the Minister for Europe (Mr Denis MacShane) told us that the move to activity-based budgeting will allow Member States to examine more closely the added value of the activities which receive financial support. He added:

"Discussion in the Council Working Group will allow us to argue for a tightening up of the proposal. This could be done, for example, through more clearly defined and measurable objectives, with a definition of desired outputs and provision for regular reporting against objectives; a systematic evaluation of the activities; and the establishment of a management committee, if practicable. We will also want the Commission to justify its selection of institutions which are to receive guaranteed funding of their operating costs, to ensure that they do offer an essential service and value for money."

5.7 The Minister said that the Government would prefer the proposed grant programme to run until the end of 2006 rather than the end of 2008.

5.8 In the Conclusion to our Report on the proposal, we said that we fully supported the Government's intention to argue for the draft Decision to be tightened up, with more clearly defined and measurable objectives. We asked the Minister a number of questions and decided to keep the document under scrutiny pending the answers.

The Minister's letters

5.9 The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Home Office (Caroline Flint) tells us that responsibility for the Government's interest in the proposal has been transferred to her Department. Her letters reply to our questions. Those questions (paraphrased in italics below) and the Minister's replies to them are as follows.

We question whether the activities are sufficiently homogeneous to be placed together in one programme and we believe that an evaluation should be made before the programme is adopted, rather than in three or four years' time. Does the Government think it appropriate for think tanks promoting specific political views to be supported from public funds?

5.10 The Minister tells us that the Government has now succeeded in reducing the period of the programme from 2004-08 to 2004-06. The programme can, therefore, be evaluated sooner. The Government believes that this provides a satisfactory compromise as time is very restricted and an evaluation would not be possible before the start of 2004. As to support for think tanks, the Minister says that the Government is content with the criteria for dispersing funds from the programme; they are robust enough to ensure that spending is directed towards the bodies most capable of promoting European citizenship. The Government has also secured an improved monitoring system for the evaluation of the achievement of the programme's objectives.

We note that an operating grant under Part 2 of the programme will not fund all the eligible expenditure in the calendar year for which it is awarded. At least 20% must be co-funded from non-Community sources. We ask the Minister why bodies which are specifically aimed at objectives of European interest should be required to seek funds from non-Community sources.

5.11 The Minister replies that the Government is, in general, supportive of co-funding because it ensures some public "buy-in" to those organisations that receive EU funds. The Government is confident that co-funders will not be able to alter schemes to fit their own agendas.

What is the timetable for the proposal?

5.12 The Minister says that the Presidency plans to submit the proposal to the meeting of the Council of Ministers on 22 December 2003. The Minister adds that the Government is content with the proposal and she hopes that her letters will assuage our concerns about it.

Legal base

5.13 In her letter of 10 December, the Minister tells us that this programme is an essential complement to the formal establishment of European citizenship by Article 17 of the EC Treaty. She continues:

"The required understanding and motivation to take an active part in the working of the Union is essential to make the granting of citizenship workable. Although there are specific legal bases connected with facilitating some of the rights of Union citizens…there is no specific Article providing for a general measure on civil participation. As no specific legal base exists for establishing this programme and the measure is necessary to attain a Community objective, Article 308 is the appropriate legal base".

5.14 The Minister amplifies this in her letter of 15 December. She tells us:

" ... active citizenship is as important to the operation of the common market as it is to the operation of any other area of Union activity. See, for example, recitals (2) and (3) of the proposed Council Decision on this point. In any event, we believe that a wide interpretation of the phrase 'in the course of the operation of the common market' in Article 308 is necessary in order to give a purposive interpretation of the Article, taking account of how the tasks and activities of the Community, as expressed in Articles 2 and 3 of the Treaty, have evolved since the Treaty was first drafted".

Conclusion

5.15 We consider it unsatisfactory that approval is sought for the extension of funding until 2006 without an evaluation of the effectiveness of the financial support that has been provided so far and, in particular, an assessment of the value for money obtained from the support of the institutions which have received guaranteed funding of their operating costs. Accordingly, we ask the Minister to obtain such an assessment. We also ask the Minister to provide us with a complete list of all the bodies which have received financial support from the programme in the last two years and for which it is proposed that funding should be earmarked in the period 2004 to 2006.

5.16 We remain concerned that Article 308 is cited as the legal base for the programme. The Article says:

"If action by the Community should prove necessary to attain, in the course of the operation of the common market [our emphasis], one of the objectives of the Community and this Treaty has not provided the necessary powers, the Council shall…take the appropriate measures".

5.17 At this stage, it seems to us that the Minister's interpretation of "in the course of the operation of the common market" is so wide as to rob the words of their plain meaning.

5.18 We shall keep the document under scrutiny until we have received the Minister's response.



11   Council Regulation (EC, Euratom) 1605/2002 of 25 June 2002. Back

12   See headnote. Back


 
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