House of Commons European Scrutiny Committee Eleventh Report of Session 2009–10 Documents considered by the Committee on 9 February 2010, including the following recommendations for debate: EU pre-accession funding for Croatia EU enlargement: pre-accession finance Report, together with formal minutes Ordered by The House of Commons to be printed 9 February 2010 HC 5-x Published on 16 February 2010 by authority of the House of Commons London: The Stationery Office Limited £0.00 Notes Numbering of documents Three separate numbering systems are used in this Report for European Union documents: Numbers in brackets are the Committee’s own reference numbers. Numbers in the form “5467/05” are Council of Ministers reference numbers. This system is also used by UK Government Departments, by the House of Commons Vote Office and for proceedings in the House. Numbers preceded by the letters COM or SEC are Commission reference numbers. Where only a Committee number is given, this usually indicates that no official text is available and the Government has submitted an “unnumbered Explanatory Memorandum” discussing what is likely to be included in the document or covering an unofficial text. Abbreviations used in the headnotes and footnotes EC (in “Legal base”) Treaty establishing the European Community EM Explanatory Memorandum (submitted by the Government to the Committee) EP European Parliament EU (in “Legal base”) Treaty on European Union GAERC General Affairs and External Relations Council JHA Justice and Home Affairs OJ Official Journal of the European Communities QMV Qualified majority voting RIA Regulatory Impact Assessment SEM Supplementary Explanatory Memorandum Euros Where figures in euros have been converted to pounds sterling, this is normally at the market rate for the last working day of the previous month. Further information Documents recommended by the Committee for debate, together with the times of forthcoming debates (where known), are listed in the European Union Documents list, which is in the House of Commons Vote Bundle on Mondays and is also available on the parliamentary website. Documents awaiting consideration by the Committee are listed in “Remaining Business”: www.parliament.uk/escom. The website also contains the Committee’s Reports. Letters sent by Ministers to the Committee about documents are available for the public to inspect; anyone wishing to do so should contact the staff of the Committee (“Contacts” below). Staff The staff of the Committee are Alistair Doherty (Clerk), Laura Dance (Second Clerk), David Griffiths (Clerk Adviser), Terry Byrne (Clerk Adviser), Sir Edward Osmotherly (Clerk Adviser), Peter Harborne (Clerk Adviser), Paul Hardy (Legal Adviser) (Counsel for European Legislation), Dr Gunnar Beck (Assistant Legal Adviser), Hannah Lamb (Senior Committee Assistant), Allen Mitchell (Committee Assistant), Mrs Keely Bishop (Committee Assistant), Dory Royle (Committee Assistant), Shane Pathmanathan (Committee Support Assistant), and Paula Saunderson (Office Support Assistant). Contacts All correspondence should be addressed to the Clerk of the European Scrutiny Committee, House of Commons, 7 Millbank, London SW1P 3JA. The telephone number for general enquiries is (020) 7219 3292/5465. The Committee’s email address is [email protected] European Scrutiny Committee, 11th Report, Session 2009–10 1 Contents Report Page Documents for debate 1 DFID (31099) EU pre-accession funding for Croatia 3 2 DFID (31030) (31255) EU enlargement: pre-accession finance 10 Documents not cleared 3 HMT (31305) Terrorist finances 20 4 HO (31238) Transfer of passenger name records concerning flights from the EU to the US 25 5 MOJ (31237) European Protection Order 32 Documents cleared 6 DEFRA (31270) Biodiversity beyond 2010 42 7 DWP (31086) Prevention from sharp injuries in the hospital and healthcare sector 46 Annex A: Extract from Letter of 17 November 2009 from Pat Mcfadden on the Framework Agreement on Parental Leave 48 8 FCO (31295) (31296) (31298) (31290) (31297) (31299) (31291) (31300) (31301) (31302) (31303) (31304) EU Special Representatives 50 9 HMT (30860) General Budget 2010 62 Annex: Table 1: Summary of 2010 PDB, Council’s 1st Reading, EP 1st Reading, Council’s 2nd Reading and EP 2nd Reading (Adopted Budget) 68 Table 2: Summary of 2010 PDB, Council’s 1st Reading, EP 1st Reading, Council’s 2nd Reading and EP 2nd Reading (Adopted Budget) –– GBP million 69 10 HMT (31253) Greek financial statistics 70 11 HMT (31273) (31274) (31275) (31276) (31277) (31278) European Globalisation Adjustment Fund 73 12 MOD (31028) Towards the integration of Maritime Surveillance 78 Documents not raising questions of sufficient legal or political importance to warrant a substantive report to the House 13 List of documents 85 2 European Scrutiny Committee, 11th Report, Session 2009–10 Formal minutes 87 Standing order and membership 88 European Scrutiny Committee, 11th Report, Session 2009–10 3 1 EU pre-accession funding for Croatia (31099) Commission Annual Report on the Instrument for Structural Policy 15365/09 for Pre-accession (ISPA) in 2008 + ADD 1 COM(09) 590 Legal base — Document originated 29 October 2009 Deposited in Parliament 9 November 2009 Department International Development Basis of consideration EM of 24 November 2009 Previous Committee Report None; but see (30090)14904/08: HC 19–viii (2008–09), chapter 18 (25 February 2009) and HC 19–iii (2008– 09), chapter 5 (14 January 2009) To be discussed in Council To be determined Committee’s assessment Politically important Committee’s decision Not cleared; for debate in European Committee B, along with Commission Communication 14685/09 and Commission 2008 Annual Report 5271/10 Background 1.1 Prior to 2007, there was a trio of pre-accession support programmes: — PHARE, which provided assistance in adopting the acquis communautaire (the entire body of European laws, including treaties, regulations and directives) through improving administrative capacity and supporting related investment; — SAPARD (Special Accession Programme for Agriculture and Rural Development), which finances agricultural and rural development; and — ISPA (Instrument for Structural Policies for Pre-Accession), which finances major infrastructure projects in the transport and environment sectors. 1.2 Both ISPA and SAPARD were designed to lay the groundwork for the countries concerned to be able properly to implement structural and cohesion funds upon accession. 1.3 From 1 January 2007, the Instrument for Pre-Accession replaced these and the other similar existing instruments (Turkey pre-accession instrument and CARDS).1 The IPA will provide a total amount of €11.468 billion over the 2007–13 Financial Perspective. 1 The Community Assistance for Reconstruction, Development and Stabilisation (CARDS) programme supported western Balkans countries (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, and the then Federal Republic of Yugoslavia) to make progress on post-conflict stabilisation and accession to EU membership, as part of the Stabilisation and Association Process. €5.13 billion (£3.50 billion) has been provided under CARDS between 2000 and 2006. 4 European Scrutiny Committee, 11th Report, Session 2009–10 1.4 ISPA is implemented by the Decentralised Implementation System (DIS) under which EC Delegations must endorse procurement documents before tenders are launched or contracts signed. So too PHARE. 1.5 SAPARD, however, is implemented in a fully decentralised manner under the Extended Decentralised Implementation System (EDIS), which involves administrations in candidate countries fully managing EU pre-accession funds. 1.6 Having been awarded Candidate Country status in June 2004, Croatia has benefited from ISPA as of 1st January 2005. Following the accession of Bulgaria and Romania on 1 January 2007, Croatia is now the sole ISPA beneficiary. 1.7 The 2007 Commission Report, which we considered on 14 January and 25 February 2009, noted various challenges: much attention was paid to the transformation of the relevant unit of the Ministry of Finance into a separate government agency — the Central Finance and Contracting Agency — in order to improve the recruitment and retention of additional suitably experienced staff (as recommended by the Commission’s auditors in 2006); tenders were launched only at the end of the year, and very little progress was apparent regarding the disbursement of funds. In sum: • no new ISPA projects were adopted in 2007; • Six projects had been approved; • 100% of the ISPA funds set aside for Croatia had been committed; • progress in implementing ISPA measures was slow, amounting by the end of 2005–07 to €6.2 million, or 10.5% of budgetary commitments. 1.8 There were a number of reasons for the slow speed of Project Implementation: above all the Implementing Agency had suffered from a lack of suitably experienced staff and poor management; final beneficiaries lacked experience in preparing and running international tenders; the excessively bureaucratic procedures established by the Croats to manage and monitor the project implementation process also adversely affected the speed of project implementation, and the Commission on a number of occasions had suggested that these procedures be streamlined. 1.9 With regard to Project Monitoring, the Commission highlighted the need to accelerate the tendering and contracting processes and to ensure that the technical assistance contracts for the preparation of future project pipelines were contracted out as soon as possible in order to