WRITTEN QUESTION P-0975/02

by Sérgio Marques (PPE-DE) to the Commission

(3 April 2002)

Subject: The Madeira International Business Centre (MIBC)

In July 2000, the Commission opened investigations against Portugal, on suspicion that the granting of financial/fiscal aid to the bodies which had taken offices in the MIBC in the year 2000 was in breach of Community law. These proceedings came as a surprise, since at the same time, the Commission's own services were drawing up, within the framework of the new policy of support for outermost regions, a text amending the Commission's New Guidelines on state aids for regional purposes, so as to ensure they took proper account of the new legal status of the outermost regions, and make the implementation of the policy on aid more flexible in those regions.

The Commission ignored the negative impact which the proceedings were going to have in the short term on the whole process of promoting and developing the MIBC the lengthy period of inactivity imposed by the Commission created a climate of mistrust amongst the users which led to their gradual relocation to competing sites and the entire process of developing this ultra-peripheral region, a process in which the industrial, commercial and financial activities surrounding the MIBC play no small role.

In this situation, it was imperative to bring the investigation of the aid arrangements to a swift conclusion. However, 18 months have now passed, the maximum deadline for investigating any state aid, and no decision whatever has yet been taken, with the only recourse left to the Portuguese authorities to end the situation being to think about using their legal power to request the permission to return a definitive decision on the affair, within two months of the submission of the request.

This uncertainty, in conjunction with the fact that Portugal, in the face of the threat of the Commission's opening a fresh investigation procedure, has decided to withdraw the notification of the new aid arrangements to boost the MIBC between 2001 and 2006, boils down to one irrefutable hard fact: the MIBC is NOT WORKING!

Given that the Commission is undoubtedly aware that this impasse is blocking one of the channels for Madeira's economic and social development, a process whose need for support in the shape of specific measures, particularly in areas such as free trade zones, state aid and fiscal policy, was recently enshrined as part of the text of the European Community Treaty, when does the Commission intend to take a decision on this issue?

Does the Commission not think that its attitude in this specific case is diametrically opposed to its entire policy of supporting the development of the outermost region in question?

Answer given by Mr Monti on behalf of the Commission

(14 May 2002)

As the Commission has previously indicated in its answers to Written Questions P-1373/00(1) and P-0277/01(2) by the Honourable Member, it has no intention whatsoever of harming the economic and social development of Madeira and regrets that there is a climate of uncertainty surrounding the future of the Madeira Free Zone. Nevertheless, it also points out that the application of the aid scheme for the Free Zone was authorised only until 31 December 2000. Any arrangements concerning the future application of the scheme must therefore be examined by the Commission, taking account of factors that include the island's status as an outermost region, on the basis of a prior notification by Portugal.

In the meantime, the Commission has decided to start an investigation into the application of the scheme during 2000 and would emphasise its intention to adopt a final decision as soon as possible. Since, as it stressed in its decision initiating the investigation, any aid granted in the Free Zone after 1 January 2000 must be considered unlawful, it takes the view that the eighteen-month deadline referred to by the Honourable Member is not applicable in the present case.

(1) OJ C 46 E, 13.2.2001.

(2) OJ C 235 E, 21.8.2001.