Brussels, 20/09/2013 (Agence Europe) - French defence minister Jean-Yves Le Drian only has a few days left as president of the Conference of Peripheral Maritime Regions (CPMR), as his term of office ends with the organisation's fortieth AGM on 26 and 27 September in St Malo in Brittany, where he hails from. As a parting shot, he has drawn up for this newsletter a balance sheet of Cohesion Policy, the next European budget and his three years as head of the CPMR. (MD/transl.fl)
Agence Europe: What do you think of reform of Cohesion Policy? Has it made a positive change? What are your concerns in this connection?
Jean-Yves Le Drian: We are in favour of the Cohesion Policy architecture proposed by the European Commission in October 2011, particularly with the extra category of regions in transition. We fought a lot on this point and it is good progress in our view. We also protested a lot about macroeconomic conditionality, which is like double punishment for some regions. We do not want it to be used and on this front, we have more in the way of assurance in the European Parliament's determination. Finally, the CPMR want partnership agreements to be drawn up between different levels of governance, between regions and member states, for all of the Operational Programmes. I think that we've pushed things forward in this area because the European Parliament and the Council should reach agreement on these measures.
Has enough of the European budget been earmarked for Cohesion Policy, and therefore for the regions, for 2014-2020?
We regretted the low level of ambition on the multiannual financial framework. We find this disturbing because the Cohesion Policy budget is one of the areas that saw the biggest budget cuts. This is unsatisfactory because we consider the Cohesion Policy as the cement keeping the European Union together. In terms of getting the population and fellow citizens to identify with the EU, this is a damaging loss of income. What we fine useful, however, is the fact that there is a clause to re-examine the Structural Funds at the same time as the mid-term review for the EU's budget for 2014-2020. This will allow the new European Commission and new European Parliament to give their views on the question. This is a positive step that will be useful for us.
How are the regions doing in the wake of the crisis? Is the Cohesion Policy a good lifebuoy?
The Cohesion Policy is a key tool for peripheral maritime regions for the European Strategy 2014-2020. A policy to exit the crisis cannot be done solely top-down by central governments. We laid a lot of emphasis on the fact that in order to have a high-performance exit, focussed on competitiveness, the regions have to play their part. We have been working hard to drive this home.
How to you view your time as president of the CPMR? What do you want for peripheral maritime regions?
I am forced to leave my post as president because it is not easy to exercise as defence minister in the French government. The association will celebrate its fortieth birthday when I leave (during the AGM at St Malo on 26 and 27 September, Ed.). It brings together more than 150 regions - while respecting the political and geographical singularities of each - and is based on three key words - experience, visibility and strength through know-how. I have tried to pursue this work in a difficult period of crisis.
These past three years, we have fought a lot for the Cohesion Policy. We have achieved great progress on all maritime issues (security, the naval industry, professional training, highways of the sea and fisheries policy). For the past three years as well, we have been calling for accessibility in the field of transport to ensure that the peripheral regions can have more connections and to avoid policies being decided solely in terms of population density in and big central European networks. I have also tried to ensure we have a full role in the EU. For example, we are now invited to the informal cohesion council, and this is a special form of recognition (our translation throughout).