During a debate at the General Affairs Council on Thursday 28 November, the European ministers stressed the importance of maintaining, post-2027, the principles of shared management, multilevel governance and partnership in the EU’s cohesion policy, which will have to be reformed.
At this EU Council meeting devoted to cohesion policy after the EU’s current Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) (2021-2027) ends, they stressed the need to involve local and regional players in designing and implementing the policy. In this context, many ministers have opposed a possible centralisation of policy, as suggested by plans within the European Commission (see EUROPE 13529/8).
Link with reforms. Delegations repeatedly mentioned the need to strike the right balance between the EU’s strategic priorities and the development needs of all regions, particularly the least developed ones.
Some ministers were also open to introducing strong incentives to implement structural reforms in Member States and to strengthening a performance-based approach to cohesion policy, without compromising its regional dimension.
Finland reportedly indicated that cohesion policy shouldn’t maintain the same volume of funds in the future. It reportedly insisted on the importance of the EU’s strategic priorities and stronger conditionality in terms of the Rule of law.
Denmark is also said to have insisted on respect for the Rule of law and the need for regions to receive more targeted support.
The Netherlands reportedly made the link with reforms (‘European Semester’) as well.
Under ‘other business’, the German delegation presented a document, backed by five Member States, on spatial planning and the implementation of Structural Fund programmes.
Shared management. Cohesion must be a priority on the agenda of the Member States, according to Commissioner for Cohesion and Reforms Elisa Ferreira, who attended her last EU Council meeting as commissioner.
“We must maintain cohesion policy and shared management, maintain a local approach, maintain the principle of appropriate levels of decision-making depending on the issues we are dealing with, i.e. the principle of subsidiarity, and maintain a bottom up approach”. She said she saw “a point of convergence” on this point. This doesn’t mean adopting a protective or rigid attitude to cohesion. This is why “we’ve opened a discussion on how we can improve the policy while maintaining the fundamental values”, summarised Ms Ferreira.
Katarzyna Pełczyńska-Nałęcz, the Polish minister for regional policy, said she liked the idea of linking cohesion policy to reforms, but “didn’t like” the idea of excessive centralisation of cohesion policy. Reforms should be defined primarily in the Member States and should take into account the diversity of regions, territories and local authorities, she summed up.
The Greek delegation defended the principles of multi-governance, subsidiarity and shared management. The same is true of Belgium, which defended the shared management approach and a simplification of the policy.
Budget. Ms Ferreira spoke of a “reasonable, adequate” budget for this policy. Answering a journalist’s question, Ms Ferreira said it was wrong to say that the funds were not being spent. Funds for the 2014-2020 period have been fully exhausted. And as far as the 2021-2027 period is concerned, there was a delay in starting, but this delay has been overcome, according to the European Commission. According to the commissioner, the average level of commitment is around 26%, and 13 EU countries have committed more than 40% of their appropriations.
“We cannot jeopardise cohesion policy as it stands, because that would mean the end of the internal market. If there are new challenges, we need to allocate more money, and new money”, said Ms Ferreira.
Demographic challenge. Some challenges are long-term in nature and can be anticipated, such as the demographic issue, acknowledged Ms Ferreira. This topic is considered important by the Hungarian presidency of the EU Council, which led the EU Council to adopt conclusions (https://aeur.eu/f/eiw ) on the subject.
“We believe that we need to find a solution that enables Member States and individual regions to meet the demographic challenges”, said Tibor Navracsics, the Hungarian minister for public administration and regional development. In fact, the conclusions “take stock of the instruments that the Member States can use to put an end to these unfavourable demographic trends”, he added, before saying: “We are convinced that immigration, whether legal or illegal, is not the solution to this problem”. According to the Hungarian minister, we need to think about long-term solutions that require family policy tools, creating infrastructures, supporting disadvantaged regions and modernising the education system and transport infrastructures.
Commissioner Ferreira retorted at the press conference that other challenges are looming on the horizon, such as climate change and the ageing of the population (which is also tied to Europe’s demographic problem). “We have therefore tried, through cohesion policy and during this mandate, to use cohesion policy to keep regions and countries alive despite unforeseen impacts”, the commissioner explained.
Border regions. The Polish minister for regional policy pointed out that Poland was the main beneficiary of funds from this policy, which “truly works for the Member States, the EU and its citizens”. The minister said that regions and local communities should be the primary focus of this policy’s future. She called for the EU to pay “special attention” to European regions affected by the war in Ukraine.
Joakim Strand, the Finnish minister for European affairs, also mentioned the problems facing Europe’s eastern regions, which he believes should be taken into account when the next MFF is adopted.
In this context, the Lithuanian delegation shared a joint declaration by four Member States on the EU regions bordering Russia and Belarus.
Catherine Vautrin, the French minister for partnership with the territories, stated that “the French position” on cohesion policy after 2027 “has obviously not been decided at this stage”. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)