Strasbourg, 15/02/2007 (Agence Europe) - MEPs, meeting in Strasbourg, adopted, without debate, the own initiative report by Lithuanian MEP Margarita Starkeviciuté (ALDE) on the Court of Auditors' special report on Trans-European Transport Networks (TEN-T). They were very critical of the slowness with which the TEN-T projects were being completed, called for closer control and wanted better coordination of the financing of these projects.
The report, which was adopted unanimously by the Parliamentary transport committee on 29 January, says that, in the current financial context, which grants only €8,013 million for the period 2007-2013, rather than the €20,350 million initially planned (see EUROPE 9295), preference should be given to the cross-border sections of priority projects and to “bottlenecks” so as to make a significant contribution to an inter-connected and interoperable TEN.
MEPs also called on the Commission to make a clear and transparent division of institutional responsibilities and to prepare a framework for coordinating activities between DG REGIO, which finances local transport infrastructure, and DG TREN, which is responsible for financing projects, in order to avoid funding the same projects twice. Basing its arguments on the very severe Court of Auditors' report adopted in April 2006 (see EUROPE 9291), the report proposes setting up a body to be responsible for the management of the networks project, which would centralise information, improve control by the Commission and provide better coordination of the various legal, administrative and technical issues between the member states involved. “There is this large sum of money” and the question raised in my report is “how to ensure best use of this money”, Ms Starkeviciuté said in a telephone interview with EUROPE. (aby)