Irish Regions Office Website

February 04, 2009

EP seeks better returns from urban development spending

Fully integrated urban development plans should form the basis for granting EU Structural Funds and receiving European Investment Bank loans for public urban development support from 2013 according to a new European Parliament report, but this will only work if sufficient resources are available and if "a minimum level" of spending in urban areas, per person and per programme period, is determined.

The Report on the urban dimension of cohesion policy in the new programming period, approved in the Regional Development Committee on 20 January, regrets that Member States are currently not obliged to promote urban development as a strategic priority. It urges national governments, the European Commission, and regional and local authorities to evaluate the impact of mainstreaming the stakeholder partnership approach of the URBAN initiative and to closely monitor the impact of EU policies and funds on the economic and social situation in urban areas.
The report points out that Member States may delegate the management of structural funding for sustainable urban development measures and argues that enabling cities to take responsibility, from planning to implementation, would be ''more efficient for regional and European growth''and could also improve the administrative capacity of local management, adding that this should become mandatory in the next programming period.

Better use by EU Regional Policy of financial engineering, such as JESSICA-style revolving funds, which offer credit on favourable terms, rather than relying solely on grants, as at present, is also urged as is the use of public/private partnerships (e.g. for infrastructure and housing projects), provided these are governed by a clear code of conduct, particularly for public authorities. The committee also believes that the ''one programme, one fund'' principle (e.g. European Social Fund for economic and social development and European Regional Development Fund for physical infrastructure investment) should be reviewed, to enable local and regional authorities to make better use of synergies between them.

http://www.europarl.europa.eu/document/activities/cont/200901/20090121att46782/20090121att46782en.pdf

Posted by iroronan at February 4, 2009 10:46 AM