8 Trans European Networks: The eTEN Programme
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11757/05
COM(05) 354
| Commission Communication: "Mid-Term Review of the e-TEN programme"
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| Legal base | — |
| Department | Trade and Industry
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| Basis of consideration | Minister's letter of 3 November 2005
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| Previous Committee Report | HC 34-vi (2005-06) para 8 (19 October 2005)
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| To be discussed in Council | To be determined
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| Committee's assessment | Politically important
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| Committee's decision | Not cleared, pending evidence session with Minister
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Background
8.1 According to the Commission's website, "eTEN is a European
Union programme that seeks to extend the potential benefits of
the single European market and the information society to all
European citizens by facilitating the widest possible participation
in the new knowledge economy". It aims at funding electronic
services, not infrastructure. It is designed to help the deployment
of telecommunication network-based services, or e-services, with
a trans-European dimension. It focuses on public services in
five areas — e-government, e-health, e-inclusion, e-learning
and trust and security — that would help make new on-line
services available across the European Union. It runs from 2003
to 2006, with a budget of €170.5m over four years.
The Commission Communication
8.2 The Commission Communication is a summary of a report carried
out by independent consultants into the operation of the eTEN
programme for the period from July 2000 to June 2004. It examines
the way the programme has been carried out, and the impact that
it has made, together with some recommendations as to how it can
do things better in the future in terms of operation and in orientating
the programme so that it has maximum relevance. It also includes
the Commission's response to the findings and recommendations.
8.3 In his 29 September 2005 Explanatory Memorandum,
the Minister of State for Industry and the Regions (Mr Alun Michael)
said the programme underwent a major re-orientation in July 2002,
when it was re-aligned "to become the major support mechanism
for projects that were intended to take forward the Europe 2005
agenda". The Minister went on to say: "the Commission
accepts the report as being a fair assessment of the programme
during the period, and welcomes the report's conclusion that the
programme is now well re-run and strategically relevant to Information
Society policies. It also recognises the need for the programme
to evolve further in order to meet the different demands in the
future".
8.4 When we considered the Commission Communication
on 19 October, we felt that the Minister's limited comments were
in line with the rather disappointing nature of his Explanatory
Memorandum, which said nothing about the wider context in which
the eTEN programme is located — not only its provenance
but, more importantly, its proposed future. A glance at the eTEN
website showed how ambitious its aspirations are. But there was
little in this Mid-Term Review that suggested that, after the
best part of a decade, the eTEN programme really knew how well
it had done or where it was going. Yet it seemed likely to appear,
in an expanded format, in the proposed €4.2 billion Competitiveness
and Innovation Programme, as part of the €800 million ICT
Policy Support element. When the Committee considered the CIP
on 4 July, it seemed that the Minister and we had the same misgivings
about an expensive and unconvincing programme, and we urged him
to approach it with appropriate rigour in the subsequent discussions
— the sort of rigour that seems lacking in the consideration
of eTEN.
8.5 We await further information on the outcome of
the CIP discussions. In the meantime, we asked the Minister for
his views on the effectiveness of the e-TEN programme in terms
of delivering concrete, sought-after outcomes; if he believed
that there should be an e-TEN-type programme under the CIP; and,
if so, why; and we kept the document under scrutiny, while considering
it relevant to the debate on "i2010 — a European Information
Society for growth and employment" that took place on 8 November
2005.
8.6 The Minister has responded in his letter of 3
November 2005.
The Minister's letter
8.7 The Minister says:
"The Committee's lack of conviction that
the eTEN programme has been effective and good value for money
is a view that the Government largely shares. Over the years significant
amounts of money have been spent without any real evidence that
a real difference has been made. However, it may be worth rehearsing
the positive points about the programme.
"First, since its re-orientation in 2002
it has supported projects in vital policy areas. It is difficult
to disagree with an emphasis on issues such as promoting inclusion
in an electronic environment, investigating new ways to engage
with the democratic process, new digital health solutions, or
looking at how the education process can benefit from the digital
age. These are all areas where it is legitimate for the European
Commission to investigate whether there is advantage to be gained
by supporting pan European solutions. Examples might be projects
such as EURODONOR, which will provide definition, specification
and realisation of a European Organ Data Exchange Portal and Data
Base to be used in the medical field of data organ exchange and
transplantation.
"UK Transplant is one of the project participants.
Another project with strong UK participation from the Museums,
Libraries and Archives Council is MICHAEL, where the goal is to
set-up, validate and launch an online pan-European service to
enable European cultural heritage to be promoted to a worldwide
audience.
"Second, it is not subject to Member State
manoeuvring and influence in terms of budget allocation. The budget
is distributed by means of public calls for proposals, with the
number of proposals outnumbering those that are funded by around
7:1, ensuring that selection can be made from only those scoring
very highly against the evaluation criteria. There is also an
independent evaluation process, with independent experts selected
from across the Member States, and with no participation by the
Commission. UK organisations, from business, local authorities
and universities, have received funding for their participation,
and have taken around 8% of the available budget.
"Finally, by the standards of some other
programmes, it is relatively modest in terms of budget. However,
I would certainly not underestimate expenditure of some €48
million a year, and it also points to the root of the Government's
reservations about the programme.
"While the focus of the programme is an
important one, and it has supported some very interesting projects,
its ambitions are seriously out of kilter with the resources it
has available to deliver them. This has led to a generally uninspiring
record of achievement. Up until the most recent call for proposals
virtually the entire budget was spent on feasibility studies,
rather than on the actual deployment of services that would make
a difference to the areas identified. It is possible that some
of those feasibility studies were subsequently used as the basis
of deployment outside the programme itself, and if so that is
to be welcomed. However, the Commission has little reliable evidence
either way, and evaluation of what difference the projects supported
have made has been generally lacking.
"There must also be some serious doubt as
to whether directing such a budget towards initial deployment
projects will make a measurable difference, or whether such expenditure
may be displacement of funds that would otherwise have been made
available from other sources. There may be a legitimate role for
the Commission to perform a facilitation function, so that initiatives
in different Member States are made aware of complementary activities
elsewhere, and perhaps offer a way in which they can co-operate.
However, such a potentially useful function would not require
a budget of €48 million.
"This suggests that at present the budget
is either too small to make a difference — and increasing
it substantially would need to be on the basis of evidence of
need that does not appear to be there — or too large for
a useful programme of more modest ambition.
"In terms of the future, it is envisaged
by the Commission that this will form part of ICT support element
of the proposed Competition and Innovation Programme (CIP). I
think that it is inevitable that such an element in the CIP, focused
on supporting i2010, will receive strong support from most Member
States and the European Parliament, and in terms of promoting
ICT solutions in the provision of public services this may well
be valid. However, we will need to look at what is proposed very
carefully.
"Simply repeating the eTEN programme, with
the lack of potential for making an impact and a difference, would
be unlikely to attract much support from the Government. We would
be more interested in a programme that facilitated co-operation
and the sharing of best practice where activity was already taking
place or planned, and it might then be legitimate for some funding
to be available to facilitate a wider knowledge of such plans,
broader adoption of such service across Europe, or where only
European implementation would be effective. We will seek to influence
thinking along those lines, and question any blind replication
of eTEN in the proposed CIP without full justification.
"I hope that this gives a helpful insight
into the Government's attitude to the eTEN programme and its future,
and that you will now feel able to clear the Mid-Term Evaluation
Document from Scrutiny."
Conclusion
8.8 We are indeed grateful to the Minister for
these insights, which might perhaps have been better offered in
his original Explanatory Memorandum. From one perspective, they
could be seen as refreshingly honest, in acknowledging that "over
the years significant amounts of money have been spent without
any real evidence that a real difference has been made".
Equally, they could be seen as indicative of one of the fundamental
problems of such EU expenditure — that, this diagnosis notwithstanding,
it is nonetheless seen as inevitable that "such an element
in the CIP, focused on supporting i2010, will receive strong support
from most Member States and the European Parliament", in
the face of which the Minister seems to suggest that the best
that we can hope for is that sufficient of the Minister's colleagues
will share his professed determination to look very carefully
at what is proposed. However, as he himself says, the present
programme is too well-funded for a Commission facilitation role
whereas "increasing it substantially would need to be on
the basis of evidence of need that does not appear to be there".
8.9 We consider this an unsatisfactory response,
and shall be inviting the Minister to explain to us in person
why he does not propose to oppose further expenditure in this
area. In the meantime, we shall keep the document under scrutiny.
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