House of Lords - European Communities

Select Committee on European Communities Thirty-Third Report

PARTNERSHIP AND TRUST: THE TACIS PROGRAMME

The Environment of Russia and the New Independent States

PART 1 INTRODUCTION AND BACKGROUND

THE PHARE AND TACIS DEMOCRACY PROGRAMME

67. The Tacis Democracy Programme was launched by the European Commission in 1992 in order to help promote a democratic Russia. Its particular aims were to:

increase knowledge of democratic practice at local and regional levels

support the work of NGOs, thereby helping to promote a pluralist democratic society

transfer specific expertise and technical skills concerning democracy and the rule of law to professional groups and associations.

68. In February 1997, the internal management of this programme was integrated with the Phare Democracy Programme, to become the Phare and Tacis Democracy Programme (PTDP). The PTDP is part-funded directly by Tacis, as part of the agreed Action Plans for individual countries. It is not normally listed as one of the Small Project Programmes, but stands as a separate programme. It continues to help build democratic institutions and to encourage the development of democratic practices in a society governed by a multi-party system. It tends to operate in two ways:

it pays for experts to advise governmental and public institutions in the NIS to develop and understanding of parliamentary practice, the rule of law, civic education and the role of an independent media;

it provides co-financing for EU NGOs to work with their counterparts in the NIS in the active promotion of democratic practices. East-west projects (not necessarily including an EU partner) are also included.

69. In 1996, the total budget for the former Tacis Democracy Programme was 11 mooch (£8 million), which supported 40 programmes. In 1997, the merged PTDP supported 45 programmes, though there were as many as 270 applications. Most of the Tacis budget in the PTDP has so far been spent on large projects in the Russian Federation and in Ukraine, focusing particularly on the development of NGOs, but also on awareness building, independent media and human rights.

70. The 1997 Tacis Annual Report stresses the continued need for this programme. It is also endorsed by the Tacis Interim Evaluation Report,[31] which has pointed to the need for further democratic development and civic society-building, in the light of local respect for the rule of law, political parties, NGOs, the media, human rights and minorities. According to this Report, the main impact of the programme up to the present time, especially in the Russian Federation, has been "to create a lively NGO sector, which both contributes to the process of democratisation and provides a bulwark against the reversal of the process of democratisation which is happening in some countries." (Belarus and Kazakhstan are mentioned in this context.)

OTHER BILATERAL ASSISTANCE PROGRAMMES

71. Many bilateral technical assistance programmes have environmental components. The United Kingdom's current international development budget now amounts to around £2254 million; of this, approximately £80 million is Know How Fund expenditure, of which in turn approximately £45 million goes as technical assistance to the NIS (the environment accounting for around £1.6 million, i.e. about 3½ per cent). Over 30 per cent of the UK's overseas development programme is spent through the EU; of this, about one third goes to the transition countries, split between the CEECs and the NIS in the ratio of about 2:1. About 15 per cent of total EU spending goes to the CEECs and about 7-8 per cent to the NIS.

  72.    Some examples of the levels of assistance which other major Western states give to the NIS are as follows (1996 figures):

Donor Country Assistance to Russian Federation Assistance to Ukraine Total assistance to the NIS Environment component (% of NIS total)

United States   £m
  265
  £m
  163
  £m
  639
£m
13   (2%)

Germany   300   43   428 33   (8%)

Sweden   12   2   19 12   (63%)

Canada   9   9   >18   N/A

Sources: DFID, OECD and World Bank (with some rounding to accommodate minor inconsistencies)

TACIS: ORGANISATION AND PROCEDURES

Organisational considerations

73. The division of roles and responsibilities in the Commission in relation to the Tacis programme has to accommodate a number of factors:

Centralised control over certain elements of programme operation, to ensure that:

(a) the rules and procedures for the use of EU funds are applied, and

(b) Tacis activities accord with overall EU political objectives and are integrated with the activities of other Dgs in the Commission;

Close cooperation with partner countries to ensure that Tacis funding is relevant to each country's own reform policies and priorities;

The need for the Member States of the EU to monitor the programme;

The ability to decentralise the implementation and monitoring work to the partner countries, a process which is beginning to take place on a planned basis. As a result, elements of management responsibility are increasingly spread between the EU's institutions and organisations in the partner countries.

New Joint Service for management of Community assistance to third countries

74. With a view to harmonising procedures (not just for Tacis), the Commission has decided to form a Common Service Directorate to manage all external assistance to nonEU countries. An internal Commission note about the Directorate's functions is reproduced in Appendix 4.[32] The Common Service came into operation in September 1998. Broadly, its responsibility is to manage the implementation of all the Commission's external assistance programmes, apart from those run by the European Community Humanitarian Office (ECHO), after the point at which financing has been approved. The Head of the Common Service reports to the Directors-General of Dgs 1, 1A, 1B and VIII. In practice it is taking a little time for the new arrangements to bed down and for the detailed division of responsibilities between the Common Service and the DGs to evolve.[33]

Relationship between the Commission, the Council and the European Parliament

75. Figure 3 demonstrates diagrammatically the main linkages between the Tacis programme and the EU institutions. The European Parliament and the Council of Ministers are the budgetary authorities for deciding the overall size of the Tacis budget in any one year. The Council of Ministers is also responsible for approving the legal framework of the Tacis programme. The European Parliament is able to influence Tacis policy by creating certain specific budget lines or by adding comments to the budget which may stipulate conditions under which specific elements of the Tacis budget should be spent. Council business involving Tacis is handled through the Development Council, on which the UK is represented by the Secretary of State for International Development.