Brussels, 25/03/2008 (Agence Europe) - How should cohesion policy be structured and implemented in the future? Such is the theme of the conference to be held on 7-8 April in Maribor (Slovenia) at the initiative of the Slovenian EU Council Presidency and the Slovenian government office for local self-government and regional policy. Participants will include European Regional Policy Commissioner Danuta Hübner, Slovenian Cohesion Policy Minister Ivan Zagar, as well as representatives of the European Parliament, the European Commission (DG Regio and Employment), European Investment Bank, Committee of the Regions, European Economic and Social Committee, OECD, European Court of Auditors, European social partners, regional associations and civil society.
The conference, which sets an important benchmark for the budget review debate in general, will also contribute to the question of “what kind of Europe do we actually want?” The debate promises to be open and critical with a “no taboos” approach and should answer the question of to what extent conceptual reform of cohesion policy is necessary. To fuel the debate, the Slovenian Presidency suggests that participants take stock of the following themes: - (1) rationale of cohesion policy in terms of its structure, scope and objectives. Participants will mainly air views on: - cohesion policy as a fiscal transfer, cohesion policy focused only on investments with trans-national dimension and re-nationalisation of cohesion policy; and - (2) cohesion policy delivery mechanisms, looking at the following questions: Is the cohesion policy implementation system effective or does it need to be improved? Is the division of responsibilities between the EU, national and local level appropriate? Is the same true for the new requirements for management and control systems or are these too costly and complex? Is it necessary to strengthen monitoring and assessment ability at European level or are improvements required only at the level of member states? (G.B.)