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THE EUROPEAN COMMITTEE OF THE REGIONS



- reiterates its opposition, as set out in its opinion on the proposal for a general regulation on the funds covered by the common strategic framework, to the principle of applying macroeconomic conditionality to the implementation of cohesion policy and, more specifically, to any links between the effectiveness of the European Structural and Investment Funds (ESIF) and sound economic governance;

- believes that reprogramming would unfairly penalise local and regional authorities because they are not responsible for excessive national deficits since, more often than not, they are constitutionally bound to balance their budgets;

- emphasises that a very similar situation applies to the debts of local and regional authorities since (as the Commission recognises in the sixth cohesion report) the increase in the public debt stems mainly from the activities of the central authorities;

- calls for the investment clause to be reviewed so as to enable regional and national investments co-financed through EU funds (ESI or CEF funding) to be excluded from the calculation of national deficits in the framework of the European Semester;

- reiterates its call for the European Commission to present a white paper setting out an EU-level typology for the quality of public investment in public accounts, on the basis of its long-term effects;

- is surprised that the European Parliament's democratic oversight of this new macroeconomic conditionality system will no longer be exercised to the full as a result of this steady technocratic drift, especially where the reprogramming of funds is concerned. As a result, the Committee issues a strong call for the Commission to restore the European Parliament's central decision-making role in the implementation of the principle of macroeconomic conditionality, in association with the European Committee of the Regions.