The Conference of Peripheral Maritime Regions (CPMR) has expressed its concerns about the increasing misuse of cohesion policy funds to respond to crises, in a report presented on Monday 11 April.
Faced with the increased use of the cohesion policy budget during the pandemic (the CRII and CRII+ initiatives) and during the war in Ukraine (the CARE and CARE+ initiatives), the regional association, in its report drafted by its director, Francesco Molica, is concerned about this trend, which raises a moral dilemma for the future of cohesion policy.
This diversion (which began in 2015 with the refugee crisis - see EUROPE 11553/13) to respond to crises is indeed double-edged: either it risks “eroding” the identity of cohesion policy, a structural policy with a long-term perspective, potentially exposing it to budgetary cuts in the future, or this flexibility is the condition for preserving the overall budget for post-2027 cohesion policy.
For the author, a balance must therefore be found in the preparation of the post-2027 cohesion policy between short-term and long-term objectives or on the degree of flexibility to be introduced to avoid undermining the cardinal principles of cohesion.
Whether other instruments of the Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) specifically designed for crisis response might be better suited than cohesion policy and should be reformed and strengthened remains an open question. Mr Molica also unearths a 2015 European Parliament proposal to create a permanent contingency reserve in the next MFF (see EUROPE 11385/11).
To access the reflection paper https://aeur.eu/f/17d
To read the 2015 European Parliament report which proposes a permanent reserve: https://aeur.eu/f/17e (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)