COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT Interim Evaluation of the Internal Security Fund - Police Accompanying the document Report from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions on interim evaluation of the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund and the Internal Security Fund
Date: 2018-06-12
Institutions: Directorate-General for Migration and Home Affairs, European Commission
Subjects: EU police cooperation, cross-border cooperation, fight against crime, fund (EU), judicial cooperation in criminal matters in the EU, terrorism

EN 

  EN 

   EUROPEAN COMMISSION  Brussels, 12.6.2018 SWD(2018) 341 final  COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT Interim Evaluation of the Internal Security Fund - Police Accompanying the document Report from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions  on interim evaluation of the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund and the Internal Security Fund {COM(2018) 464 final} - {SWD(2018) 339 final} - {SWD(2018) 340 final}  
 
 
 
 
 
 
TABLE OF CONTENTS 

3 

5 

TABLE OF CONTENTS ....................................................................................................................................... 1 
ABBREVIATIONS .............................................................................................................................................. 2 
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ..................................................................................................................................... 3 
INTRODUCTION ....................................................................................................................................... 5 
1 
BACKGROUND TO THE INTERVENTION .................................................................................................... 6 
2 
Baseline ..................................................................................................................................... 6 
2.1 
Description of ISF-P and its objectives ................................................................................... 10 
2.2 
IMPLEMENTATION / STATE OF PLAY ...................................................................................................... 16 
Description of the implementation process .............................................................................. 16 
3.1 
Description of the implementation status ................................................................................ 17 
3.2 
4  METHOD............................................................................................................................................... 25 
Short description of methodology ............................................................................................ 25 
4.1 
Evaluation questions ................................................................................................................ 26 
4.2 
4.3 
Limitations and robustness of findings .................................................................................... 27 
ANALYSIS AND ANSWERS TO THE EVALUATION QUESTIONS ................................................................. 29 
How effective has ISF-P been so far? ...................................................................................... 29 
5.1 
How efficient has ISF-P been so far? ...................................................................................... 37 
5.2 
How much simplification and reduction of administrative burden has ISF-P brought so far? 40 
5.3 
How relevant has ISF-P been so far? ....................................................................................... 41 
5.4 
How coherent and complementary has ISF-P been so far? ...................................................... 45 
5.5 
5.6  What is the EU added value of ISF-P so far? .......................................................................... 49 
5.7 
How sustainable are the actions implemented under ISF-P so far? ......................................... 52 
CONCLUSIONS AND ISSUES FOR FURTHER CONSIDERATION .................................................................. 55 
Effectiveness ............................................................................................................................ 55 
6.1 
Efficiency ................................................................................................................................ 56 
6.2 
Simplification and reduction of administrative burden ............................................................ 57 
6.3 
Relevance ................................................................................................................................ 57 
6.4 
Coherence and complementarity ............................................................................................. 58 
6.5 
EU Added Value ...................................................................................................................... 59 
6.6 
Sustainability ........................................................................................................................... 60 
6.7 
ANNEX 1: PROCEDURAL INFORMATION ......................................................................................................... 61 
ANNEX 2: METHODS AND ANALYTICAL METHODS ........................................................................................ 62 
ANNEX 3: STAKEHOLDER CONSULTATION ..................................................................................................... 64 
ANNEX 4: EVALUATION QUESTIONS .............................................................................................................. 70 
ANNEX 5: COST/BENEFIT ANALYSIS ............................................................................................................... 73 
ANNEX 6: EXAMPLES OF PROJECTS USED TO ANSWER THE EVALUATION QUESTIONS ..................................... 78 

6 

1 

 
 
 
ABBREVIATIONS

AMIF 

CBRN-E 

CIPS 

DG 
CONNECT 

DG HOME 

Asylum Migration and 
Integration Fund 

Chemical, biological, 
radiological and nuclear 
explosives 

Specific programme 
Prevention, 
Preparedness and 
Consequence 
Management of 
Terrorism and Other 
Security-related Risks 

DG Communications 
Networks, Content & 
Technology 

Directorate-General for 
Migration and Home 
Affairs 

DG JUST 

DG Justice and 
Consumers 

DG TAXUD  DG Taxation and 

Customs Union 

EBCGA 

European Border and 
Coast Guard Agency 
(Frontex) 

EBF 

External Borders Fund 

EMAS 

Emergency assistance 

MFF 

ERF 

EU 

eu-LISA 

Eurostat 

ESIF 

ESF 

FTE 

ISEC 

European Refugee 
Fund 

European Union 

European Agency for 
the operational 
management of large-
scale IT systems in the 
area of freedom, 
security and justice 

Statistical office of the 
European Union 

European Structural 
and Investment Funds 

European Social Fund 

Full-time equivalent 

Specific programme 
Prevention of and Fight 
against Organised 
Crime 

ISF 

Internal Security Fund 

ISF-BV 

ISF Borders and Visa 

ISF-P 

ISF Police 

NP 

PNR 

RAN 

RF 

SAC 

SOLID 

SFC2014 

SLTD 

SSL 

VIS 

Multiannual financial 
framework 

National programme 

Passenger Name 
Record 

Radicalisation 
Awareness Network 

European Return Fund 

Schengen associated 
countries 

General programme 
Solidarity and 
Management of 
Migration Flows 

Shared Fund 
Management Common 
System of DG HOME 

Stolen and Lost Travel 
Documents database 

Security and 
safeguarding liberties 
programme 

Visa Information 
System 

     List of countries 

AT 

BE 

BG 

CH 

CY 

CZ 

DE 

Austria 

Belgium 

Bulgaria 

Switzerland 

Cyprus 

Czech Republic 

Germany 

DK 

Denmark 

EE 

EL 

ES 

FI 

FR 

HR 

HU 

IS 

Estonia 

Greece 

Spain 

Finland 

France 

Croatia 

Hungary 

Iceland 

Italy 

Lichtenstein 

PL 

PT 

Poland 

Portugal 

Lithuania 

RO 

Romania 

Luxembourg 

Latvia 

Malta 

Netherlands 

Norway 

SE 

SI 

SK 

UK 

Sweden 

Slovenia 

Slovakia 

United Kingdom 

IT 

LI 

LT 

LU 

LV 

MT 

NL 

NO 

2 

 
 
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 

This  staff  working  document  presents  the  interim  evaluation  of  the  instrument  for  police 
cooperation,  preventing  and  combating  crime,  and  crisis  management  which  is  part  of  the 
Internal Security Fund for the programming period 2014-2020, specifically covering the period 
running from January 2014 until the end of June 2017 (it is referred to as ‘ISF-P’, or ‘the Fund’ 
throughout this document). ISF-P was designed to help ensure a high level of security in the EU. 

The evaluation assesses ISF-P’s progress towards meeting its objectives. The findings will: 
inform the legislators and all relevant stakeholders of its achievements so far; 

 
  provide  the  evidence  base  for  the  Member  States  and  the  Commission  to  address  any 

weaknesses and to take corrective measures to minimise their impact; and  
inform the design of the future funds. 

 

The  total  resources  needed  to  implement  ISF-P  were  initially  estimated  at  EUR 1 004  million 
divided into two parts: (i) EUR 662 million or 66 % to be managed by Member States under the 
framework of multiannual national programmes and (ii) EUR 342 million or 34 %, managed by 
the Commission under Union actions and emergency assistance. 

An interim evaluation, taking place only a few years after the funding period started, has obvious 
limitations.  In  addition,  the  migration  and  security  crisis  has  had  a  major  impact  on  the  home 
affairs policy area and thus also on all the funds, not only ISF-P. 

Nevertheless, looking at the Fund’s effectiveness, early evidence at this stage of implementation 
shows  that  progress is  being  made  towards  fulfilling  the  different  levels  of  ISF-P’s  objectives. 
The Fund has helped strengthen Member States’ capabilities to combat cross-border, serious and 
organised  crime,  including  terrorism  and  to  strengthen  their  mutual  cooperation  as  well  as 
improving Member States’ capacity to effectively manage security-related risks and crises. 

In terms of efficiency, the results of the Fund have been achieved at a reasonable cost in terms of 
both human and financial resources deployed, the effective management and control systems in 
place  that  ensured  the  Fund  was  correctly  implemented,  and  effective  measures  that  prevented 
irregularities from occurring. The perceived administrative burden appears to be the main factor 
undermining efficiency. However, assessing the part of Fund implemented by the Member States 
against the criterion of simplification and reduction of administrative burden has been complex 
as  the  previous  funds  (ISEC  and  CIPS)  were  fully  implemented  under  a  direct  management 
mode. 

This evaluation finds that the ISF-P’s original rational for intervention and its objectives are still 
relevant, also in light of the changing political priorities that have made security issues a major 
concern.  The  broad  scope  and  flexibility  offered  by  the  Fund  helped  to  address  the  changing 
needs and thus helped to ensure its relevance. 

Coherence  and  complementarity  between  ISF-P  and  other  relevant  EU  and  national 
instruments  (ISF  Borders  and  Visa  and  AMIF  (Asylum,  Migration  and  Integration  Fund),  and 
also the justice programme,  Hercule III,  Horizon 2020)  was ensured at the programming  stage 
and followed-up during the Fund’s implementation. The different funding modes of ISF-P were 
also  found  to  be  coherent  and  complementary  to  each  other.  Cooperation  with  relevant  EU 
agencies,  especially  Europol  and  CEPOL  (the  EU  agency  for  law  enforcement  training)  is 
crucial. 

3 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
The  Fund  has  ensured  EU  added  value  in  terms  of  improving  cross-border  cooperation, 
exchanging  of  knowledge  and  best  practices,  and  mutual  trust  amongst  Member  States’  law 
enforcement  authorities.  It  also  ensured  EU  added  value  when  key  EU  policies  were  being 
applied  and  implemented.  Furthermore,  it  has  helped  to  broaden  the  scope  in  terms  of 
investments in under-prioritised or highly specialised policy areas. 

The sustainability of effects is considered a common feature of most ISF-P funded projects as 
the  actions  are  usually  aligned  with  and  complementary  to  national  priorities  and  EU 
requirements.  Therefore,  these  projects  are  generally  planned  with  a  view  to  remaining 
operational  beyond  the  Fund’s  support.  In  addition,  a  wide  range  of  measures  to  ensure 
sustainability of project results have been put in place. 

Nevertheless, there is always room for improvement and for lessons to be learned. For example, 
the monitoring and evaluation framework itself should be developed to further address (i) issues 
such  as  baseline  values,  definition  of  indicators,  and  synchronisation  of  calendars,  (ii) matters 
linked to efficiency of the Fund and flexibility and (iii) perceived administrative burden. 

4 

 
 
 
 
 
 
1  INTRODUCTION 

This Commission staff working document presents the interim evaluation of the Internal Security 
Fund,  the  instrument  for  police  cooperation,  preventing  and  combating  crime,  and  crisis 
management  (ISF-P)  in  line  with  Article 57(2)  of  Regulation  (EU)  No  514/20141,  the 
Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2017/2072 and the Better Regulation guidelines3. 

Member States submitted to the Commission an interim evaluation report on the implementation 
of  actions  and  progress  towards  achieving  the  objectives  of  their  national  programmes  by 
31 December  2017.  On  the  basis  of  these  reports,  the  Commission  has  to  submit  an  interim 
evaluation report on the implementation of Regulation (EU) No 513/2014, Regulation (EU) No 
514/2014 and Regulation (EU) No 515/2014 to the European Parliament, to the Council, to the 
European  Economic  and  Social  Committee  and  to  the  Committee  of  the  Regions  by  30 June 
2018. 

The purpose of this evaluation is to: 

1) ensure transparency and accountability in the ISF’s implementation, the general objective of 
which is to ensure a high level of security within an area of freedom, security and justice; and 

2)  help  make  the  future  implementation  of  EU  instruments  in  the  fields  covered  by  ISF  more 
relevant,  effective,  efficient,  and  sustainable,  and  enable  them  to  provide  EU  added  value  and 
simplification measures and reduce administrative burden. 

This evaluation has looked at the progress made in implementing the programme, and assessed 
whether corrective  actions are needed to  make  sure  that the programme delivers as planned. It 
also contributes to the preparation of the next generation of funding instruments (the successors 
of ISF-P), under the post-2020 multi-annual financial framework (MFF). 

This evaluation covers the whole ISF-P programme in all EU Member States, except Denmark 
and the United Kingdom, which do not participate in the ISF-P. The evaluation covers the period 
from 1 January 2014 until 30 June 2017 and it looks into the national programmes, Union actions 
and emergency assistance financed under ISF-P. 

1   Regulation  (EU)  No  514/2014  of  the  European  Parliament  and  of  the  Council  of  16  April  2014  laying  down 
general provisions on the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund and on the instrument for financial support 
for police cooperation, preventing and combating crime, and crisis management (OJ L 150 of 20 May 2014). 
2   Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2017/207 of 3 October 2016 on the common monitoring and evaluation 
framework  provided  for  in  Regulation  (EU)  No  514/2014  laying  down  general  provisions  on  the  Asylum, 
Migration  and  Integration  Fund  and  on  the  instrument  for  financial  support  for  police  cooperation,  preventing 
and combating crime, and crisis management (OJ L 33 of 8 February 2017). 

3   https://ec.europa.eu/info/files/better-regulation-guidelines_en 

5 

 
 
 
 
                                                 
2  BACKGROUND TO THE INTERVENTION 

2.1  Baseline 

Ensuring a high level of freedom and security within Europe has been at the top of the EU policy 
agenda since the Tampere Council Conclusions in 1999. Policies such as migration, security and 
management of the external borders became a strategic priority at EU level, through the priorities 
set by The Hague programme4 and the Stockholm programme and its action plan5. Art. 67 TFEU 
defines one of the EU’s overarching objectives: offering European citizens ‘an area of freedom, 
security  and  justice  with  respect  for  fundamental  rights  and  the  different  legal  systems  and 
traditions of the Member States’ as well as ‘ensure a high level of security through measures to 
prevent and combat crime, racism and xenophobia, and through measures for coordination and 
cooperation between police and judicial authorities and other competent authorities’. 

In  the  field  of  internal  security,  the  Commission’s  communication  on  the  internal  security 
strategy in action (ISS)6, adopted in 2010, identified clear strategic goals and provided a basis for 
concerted  action  to  address  common  security  challenges  in  the  years  to  come.  Through 
cooperation and solidarity at EU level and with non-EU countries, substantial progress has been 
made  towards  creating  a  more  open  and  secure  Europe.  Strategic  objectives  included:  disrupt 
serious  and  organised  crime  networks;  prevent  terrorism  and  address  radicalisation  and 
recruitment; raise levels of security for citizens and businesses in cyberspace; increase Europe's 
resilience to crises and disasters 

Within this context, the programme ‘Security and Safeguarding Liberties’ was put in place for 
the  period  2007-2013  (almost  EUR 800  million)  and  built  up  of  two  separate  financial 
instruments following the different legal bases provided in the Treaties7: (i) Specific programme 
Prevention  of  and  Fight  against  Organised  Crime  (ISEC)  and  (ii)  Specific  programme 
Prevention,  Preparedness  and  Consequence  Management  of  Terrorism  and  Other  Security-
related Risks (CIPS)8. 

The  security  and  safeguarding  liberties  (SSL)  general  programme  and  its  specific  programmes 
included the following general objectives: 

  contribute  to  protecting  citizens,  their  liberties  and  society  against  terrorist  attacks  and 
related  incidents,  and  to  safeguard  the  EU  as  an  area  of  freedom,  security  and  justice 
(SSL); 

4   Communication from the Commission to the Council and the European Parliament: The Hague Programme: Ten 
priorities for the 2005-2010, The Partnership for European renewal in the field of Freedom, Security and Justice 
(COM(2005) 184 final – Official Journal C 236 of 24.9.2005). 

5   Adopted by the European Council on 2 December 2009 (document no. 17024/09), provides a framework for EU 
action on the issues of citizenship, justice, security, asylum, immigration and  visa policy for the period 2010–
2014. Action plan COM(2010) 171 final of 20/04/2010. 

6   Communication  from  the  Commission  to  the  European  Parliament  and  the  Council  –  The  Internal  Security 
Strategy in Action: Five Steps towards a more secure Europe (COM(2010) 673 final of 22 November 2010). 
7   Law  enforcement,  police  cooperation  and  crime  prevention  are  subject  to  Title  VI  of  the  Treaty  on  European 
Union  (Articles  29-42).  Preparedness  and  consequence  management  of  terrorism  refers  to  civil  protection 
measures, set under the Treaty establishing the European Community (Article 3(1)(u)). 

8   COM/2005/0124 final (GPSSL); Decision No 2007/124/EC (CIPS), Decision 2007/125/JHA (ISEC) – OJ L 58, 

24.2.2007. 

6 

 
                                                 
  contribute  to  developing  other  EU  policies  such  as  police  and  judicial  cooperation  in 
criminal  matters,  protection  of  the  environment,  public  health,  transport,  research  and 
technological development and economic and social cohesion (SSL); 

  contribute to supporting Member States efforts to prevent, prepare for, and protect people 
and  critical  infrastructure  against  terrorist  attacks  and  other  security-related  incidents 
(CIPS); 

  contribute  to  ensuring  protection  in  areas  such  as  the  crisis  management,  environment, 
public health, transport, research and technological development and economic and social 
cohesion, and in the field of terrorism and other security-related risks within the area of 
freedom, security and justice (CIPS); 

  contribute  to  a  high  level  of  security  for  citizens  by  preventing  and  combating  crime, 
organised  or  otherwise,  in  particular  terrorism,  human  trafficking  and  offences  against 
children, illicit drug trafficking and illicit arms trafficking, corruption and fraud (ISEC); 

  contribute to developing EU policies, by focusing on four themes: crime prevention and 
criminology,  law  enforcement,  protection  and  support  to  witnesses,  and  protection  of 
victims (ISEC). 

The  two  funding  programmes  were  implemented  under  direct  management  only,  by  means  of 
Community actions. 

Moreover, to ensure fair responsibility-sharing towards common migration and asylum policies 
and borders management, the EU provided financial support to strengthen (i) legal migration and 
integration, (ii) asylum, (iii) irregular migration and return, and (iv) management of the external 
borders and visa policy, as well as the external dimension of these policies. In light of this, under 
the  2007-2013  programming  period,  the  General  programme  Solidarity  and  Management  of 
Migration Flows (SOLID) was put in place, with a total contribution of almost EUR 4 billion. 

The  SOLID  programme’s  legal  base  has  been  built  up  of  four  separated  financial  instruments: 
(i) the  European  Refugee  Fund  (ERF),  (ii) the  European  Fund  for  the  Integration  of  Third-
Country Nationals (EIF), (iii) the European Return Fund (RF) and (iv) the External Borders Fund 
(EBF)9. 

CIPS and ISEC, together with the SOLID programme, were replaced by AMIF and the Internal 
Security  Funds  (ISF  Borders  and  Visa  and  ISF  Police)  in  April  2014.  The  main  reason  for  
creating  the  two-pillar  structure  was  to  contribute  to  the  simplification,  rationalisation, 
consolidation and transparency of funding in the fields of internal security. 

The table below10 shows the development (in size and scope) of funds in the home affairs area, 
how they evolved over time, leading up to the development of the current generation of funds, 
namely AMIF and ISF. 

9   Decision No 574/2007/EC (EBF), Decision No 573/2007/EC (ERF), Decision No 575/2007/EC (RF) – OJ L 144 

of 6.6.2007; Council Decision 2007/435/EC (EIF) – OJ L 168 of 28.6.2007. 

10   See Annex 5 for a complete comparative table of all previous and current home affairs funds. 

7 

 
                                                 
Table 2: Summary overview of home affairs funds and programmes during 2007-2013 and 2014-202011 

General 
Programm
e 

Policy 
area 

Fund / Specific Programme 
Budget, Participation & Objectives 

Previous Funds (2007-2013) 

European Refugee Fund (ERF III) 
EUR 614 million12, All Member States except DK 

Asylum 

  Support and encourage Member States  in receiving 

refugees and displaced persons 

  Emergency measures to address sudden mass influx 

if migrants and asylum seekers 

European Fund for the Integration of Third-Country 
Nationals (EIF) 
EUR 825 million, All Member States except DK 

Curent Funds (2014-2020) 
Asylum Migration and Integration 
Fund (AMIF) 
EUR 3 137 million (initial) 
All Member States except DK 

  Strengthen and develop all aspects 

of the CEAS 

  Support legal migration to the 
Member States and promote 
effective integration of third-
country nationals 

General 
Programme 
Solidarity 
and 
Managemen
t of 
Migration 
Flows 

(93% to 
96% shared 
managemen
t; remainder 
under 
centralised 
direct 
managemen
t) 

General 
Programme 
Security and 
Safeguardin
g Liberties 
(centralised 
direct 
managemen
t) 

Integration 
of legally 
residing 
TCNs, 
legal 
migration 

Return  

Integrated 
border 
manageme
nt and visa  

Prevention 
of and 
fight 
against 
organised 
crime 

Combating 
terrorism 
and other 
security-
related 
risks 

  Support  the  integration  of  non-EU  immigrants  into 

  Enhance fair and effective return 

European societies 

European Return Fund (RF) 
EUR 676 million, All Member States except DK 

  Improve return management 
  Encourage  development 

cooperation  between 

Member States and countries of return 

External Borders Fund (EBF) 
EUR 1 820 million, All Member States (including RO 
& BG and the Schengen associated states from 2010) 
except the UK and IE 

  Financial solidarity amongst Schengen countries 
  Manage  efficient  controls  and  the  flows  at  the 

external borders 

  Improve management of the consular authorities 
Specific Programme Prevention of and Fight against 
Organised Crime (ISEC) 
EUR 600 million, All Member States 

  Crime  prevention, 

law  enforcement,  witness 

protection and support, victims protection 

Specific Programme Prevention, Preparedness and 
Consequence Management of Terrorism and Other 
Security-related Risks (CIPS) 
EUR 140 million, All Member States 

  Protection of citizens and critical infrastructure from 

terrorist attacks and other security incidents 

strategies and contribute to 
combating illegal immigration 

  Enhance solidarity and 

responsibility sharing between 
Member States, particularly those 
most affected by the migratory 
flows 

Internal security Fund (ISF) 
EUR 3 764 million (initial) 

ISF Borders and Visa 
All Member States except IE and UK 
plus the Schengen associated states 
CH, IS, LI, NO 

  Ensuring a high level of security in 
the EU and facilitate legitimate 
travel 

  Visa and support integrated border 

management 

ISF Police 
All Member States except DK and 
UK 

  Ensure a high level of security in 

the EU, fight against crime, 
manage risks and crisis 

The share of funding for home affairs in the EU budget steadily grew (in the period 2007-2013 it 
amounted to EUR 6.45 billion or 0.77 % of the total EU budget, covering not only the financing 
programmes,  but  also  funding  for  large-scale  IT  systems  (Visa  Identification  System  (VIS), 
Schengen  Information  System  (SIS),  EURODAC  and  the  agencies).  The  spending  during  this 
period  has  been  characterised  by  heavy  ‘back-loading’,  increasing  from  EUR 500  million  in 
2007 to EUR 1.5 billion in 2013. 

Results from previous evaluations and stakeholder feedback confirm that these instruments have 
been  generally  effective  and  that  the  EU  funding  added  genuine  value11.  Nevertheless,  the  EU 
has been facing a number of policy challenges in the area of crime and terrorism, not all of which 

11   Impact assessment accompanying the proposal for the Home Affairs Funds in the period 2014-2020 (SEC(2011) 

1358 of 15.11.2011). 

12   After adoption of EASO; takes account of Decision No 458/2010/EU amending the ERF basic act. 

8 

 
                                                 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
could be sufficiently covered by ISEC and CIPS. These are schematically collected in the table 
below. 

Table 3: Overview of challenges faced by Member States and the EU in the area of crime and terrorism to be addressed during 
the period 2014-202011 

  Increased cross-border organised crime and reduced effectiveness of national law enforcement activities as well 

as criminals evading law enforcement bodies by crossing over European borders and jurisdictions. 

  More sophisticated crimes such as cybercrime and payment card fraud growing in size. 
  Quick development of the nature of crime. 
  Terrorism as an increased concern for the EU citizens as it has presented unique threats compared to organised 
crime due to the sporadic and transnational nature of offences, as well as the low cost of carrying out terrorist  
attacks (including use of the internet) compared to the very high implications and costs of terrorist activities. 
  Lack of an effective EU-level strategy and coordination between national authorities on terrorism, including 

increased risks for Member States’ critical infrastructures. 

  Growing connections between terrorism and organised criminal activities, separatist and ethno-nationalist 

terrorist groups. 

  Increasing extremism. 

CIPS  and  ISEC  complemented  each  other  and  provided  a  holistic  approach  to  the  EU’s 
prevention of and fight against organised crime and to combating terrorism and other security-
related  risks.  However,  there  have  been  drawbacks,  identified  by  the  ex  post  evaluations13,  as 
well as during the Commission’s impact assessment accompanying its proposals for the 2014-20 
generation of home affairs funds11. 

Overall,  such  findings  included  a  significant  geographical  imbalance  in  terms  of  programme 
coverage,  administrative  burden,  lack  of  clarity  in  relation  to  the  areas  covered  by  the 
programme, a range of activities that was too wide leading to fragmentation and lack of focus. In 
addition,  a  need  for  a  clearer  scope  and  for  boosting  coordination  among  organisations  was 
identified. Besides, the programmes have neither developed as needed nor as fast as the terrorist 
threats. Therefore, there was an urgent need for an efficient update which is being provided by 
the ISF-P. 

This staff working document also analyses the extent to which the recommendations from the ex 
post evaluations of CIPS and ISEC have been taken into account in ISF-P (see below table). 

Table 4: Overview of findings and recommendations that have shaped ISF-P 

Ex post evaluations of ISEC and CIPS  

What has ISF-P addressed and how 

  Suggested a more flexible and faster funding 

mechanism to address needs on the ground and 
identify the needs for reducing administrative 
burden. 

  The structure was simplified as ISF-P includes only 
two specific objectives (crime prevention and crisis 
and risks) supported by seven operational objectives. 
Moreover, emergency assistance (EMAS) has been 
available to approach any unexpected emergency 
situation.  

  Recommended a dedicated technical assistance 

  There is a technical assistance budget in order to 

budget which could fund an improved monitoring 
system, including IT systems, visits, technical 
expertise, etc. 

  Proposed more detailed reports from coordinating 
organisations to improve monitoring of results. 

cover specific personnel, IT systems, business trips, 
etc. 

  Member States submit annual implementation 

reports under shared management and interim and 
final reports (technical/operational and financial) 
under direct management.  

13  Formal approval from the Commission still pending for ISEC/CIPS ex post evaluations. 

9 

 
 
                                                 
  Highlighted the importance of creating of 

  Europol Information System (EIS) and the 

networks and fund more analytical activities. 

Radicalisation Awareness Network (RAN) were 
created. 

  Claimed that underspending was a major concern 

  Different delivery mechanisms (shared and direct 

in ISEC and CIPS  

management)  

2.2  Description of ISF-P and its objectives 

In a nutshell 

ISF-P aims to ensure a high level of security in the EU through supporting the fight against crime 
and managing risks and crises effectively. 

2.2.1  The ISF-P 

The legal basis for ISF-P is Regulation (EU) No 513/2014 (the Specific Regulation)14 adopted by 
the European Parliament and the Council and it is based on Articles 82(1), 84 and 87(2) TFEU. 
In  addition,  general  provisions  for  both  AMIF  and  ISF  are  laid  down  in  Regulation  (EU)  No 
514/2014  (Horizontal  Regulation)1.  These  two  Regulations  are  complemented  by  Commission 
Delegated  Regulation  (EU)  2017/207  on  the  common  monitoring  and  evaluation  framework 
(CMEF Regulation)2. 

ISF-P’s aim is to help ensure a high level of security in the EU through the fight against crime 
and  managing  risk  and  crises.  All  Member  States,  except  for  DK  and  the  UK15,  contribute  to 
implementing it. 

However,  the  recent  terrorist  attacks  in  Europe  have  highlighted  the  need  for  a  stronger  EU 
response to terrorism and foreign terrorist fighters. The EU has tried to provide a comprehensive 
and  quick  reaction  to  these  significant  challenges,  by  formulating  its  European  agenda  on 
security16  in  2015  that  included  five  key  principles  on  which  all  actors  involved  had  to  work 
together:  

  ensure full compliance with fundamental rights; 

  more transparency, accountability and democratic control; 

  ensure existing EU legal instruments are better applied and implemented;  

  a more joined-up inter-agency and a cross-sectoral approach; and  

  bring together all internal and external dimensions of security. 

This agenda has also provided a clear framework for the Member States to work together better 
on security and was the basis in June 2015 for the European Council’s endorsement of a renewed 

14   Regulation No 513/2014 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 16 April 2014 establishing as part of 
the  Internal  Security  Fund,  the  instrument  for  police  cooperation,  preventing  and  combating  crime,  and  crisis 
management (OJ L 150/93 of 20 May 2014). 

15   The  Danish  opt‐out  from  measures  under  Title  V  TFEU  is  now  governed  by  Protocol  No  22  attached  to  the 

Treaty. 

16   Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament and the Council – The European Agenda on 

Security (COM(2015) 185 final of 28 April 2015). 

10 

 
 
                                                 
internal  security  strategy  for  the  period  2015-2020.  The  priorities  of  this  strategy  are:  tackling 
and  preventing  terrorism,  preventing  and  fighting  serious  and  organised  crime  and,  preventing 
and fighting cybercrime. 

Finally,  legislative  acts  have  been  adopted  or  proposed  on  setting  up  stronger  and  smarter 
information systems for security, making the data architecture of EU information systems more 
effective  and  efficient.  These  include  the  European  Criminal  Records  Information  Exchange 
System  proposal  for  a  Regulation  (ECRIS)17  and  passenger  name  record  (PNR)  directive18. 
There is an increased need for the interoperability of these IT systems in order to improve data 
management in the area of security19. 

Considering  the  evolving  needs  and  challenges  related  to  the  security  concerns,  the  ISF-P’s 
initial budget has been increased to support Member States in implementing the passenger name 
record  directive  and  develop  information  exchange  and  interoperability  tools.  The  following 
analysis  of  needs  should  be  read  in  correlation  with  the  answer  to  the  evaluation  question  on 
relevance in sub-chapter 5.4 on page 41. 

The needs of ISF-P 

The overview of challenges faced by Member States and the EU in the area of home affairs in 
the  previous  period  2007-2013  and  presented  in  Table  2  above,  could  be  translated  into  the 
following needs that ISF-P tries to address. 

  Crime prevention: the need to improve:  interoperability of law enforcement systems in 
the  Member  States;  intelligence  sharing  between  Member  States;  cross-border  joint 
operational  coordination  and  cooperation  between  Member  States;  core  capacities  in 
some  Member  States  (trained  staff,  infrastructure  for  training);  poor  quality  of  forensic 
data; uneven capacity to provide victim support; lack of capacity to carry out threat and 
risk  assessments;  poor  communication  and  involvement  of  citizens/private  sector;  and 
weak cooperation with relevant third countries. 

  Risks and crises: the need to improve: cross-border joint processes and procedures in case 
of  man-made  disasters;    uneven  coordination  and  operational  cooperation  between 
national crisis centres; lack of capacity to carry out threat and risk assessments; training 
infrastructure;  poor  public/private  partnerships;  insufficient  cross-border  simulation 
exercises; and weak partnerships with relevant third countries. 

General and specific objectives of ISF-P 

As set out in Article 3 of the Specific Regulation, the general objective of the Fund; ‘…shall be 
to  contribute  to  ensuring  a  high  level  of  security  in  the  Union’.  This  objective  further  breaks 
down in two specific objectives on crime prevention and on risks and crises: 

Specific Objective 1: Crime prevention 

17   Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council establishing a centralised system for the 
identification  of  the  Member  States  holding  conviction  information  on  third  -country  nationals  and  stateless 
persons  (TCN)  to  supplement  and  support  the  European  Criminal  Records  Information  System  (ECRIS-TCN 
system) and amending Regulation (EU) No 1077/2011 (COM(2017) 344 final of 29 June 2017). 

18   Directive  (EU)  2016/681  of  the  European  Parliament  and  of  the  Council  of  27  April  2016  on  the  use  of 
passenger  name  record  (PNR)  data  for  the  prevention,  detection,  investigation  and  prosecution  of  terrorist 
offences and serious crime (OJ L 119 of 4 May 2016). 

19   COM(2017) 793 final and COM(2017) 794 final of 12 December 2017. 

11 

 
                                                 
‘crime  prevention,  combating  cross-border,  serious  and  organised  crime  including  terrorism, 
and  reinforcing  coordination  and  cooperation  between  law  enforcement  authorities  and  other 
national authorities of Member States, including with Europol or other relevant Union bodies, 
and with relevant third countries and international organisations ‘ 

Through  this  specific  objective,  the  ISF-P  is  supporting  the  fight  against  all  forms  of  crime, 
including  terrorism and  organised crime. In  addition, it is helping to increase coordination and 
cooperation  among  several  law  enforcement  authorities  at  national  and  EU  level  as  well  as 
Europol and other international organisations. 

Specific Objective 2: Risks and crises 

‘enhancing  the  capacity  of  Member  States  and  the  Union  for  managing  effectively  security-
related  risks  and  crises,  and  preparing  for  and  protecting  people  and  critical  infrastructure 
against terrorist attacks and other security-related incidents’ 

The ISF-P ensures through this objective that all Member States’s capacity to manage security-
related risks effectively is strengthened, improved and efficient. Moreover, this objective focuses 
on the need to prepare people and critical infrastructures against any attack, particularly terrorist 
ones. 

In  addition,  to  sufficiently  cover  and  reach  these  specific  objectives  a  number  of  operational 
objectives were defined in order to support a successful implementation. 

Table 5: ISF-P operational objectives 

  Promote and develop measures strengthening Member States capability to prevent crime and combat 

cross-border, serious and organised crime including terrorism, in particular through (i) public-private 
partnerships, (ii) exchange of information and best practice, (iii) access to data, (iv) interoperable technologies, 
(v) comparable statistics, (vi) applied criminology, (vii) public communication and (viii) awareness raising. 
  Promote and develop administrative and operational coordination, cooperation, mutual understanding 

and exchange of information among Member States law enforcement authorities, other national 
authorities, Europol or other relevant EU bodies and, where appropriate, with third countries and international 
organisations. 

  Promote and develop training schemes, including schemes for technical and professional skills and 

knowledge of obligations related to respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms; and in implementing 
European training policies, including through specific EU law enforcement exchange programmes, in order to 
foster a genuine European judicial and law enforcement culture. 

  Promote and develop measures, safeguards, mechanisms and best practice for early identification, protection 

and support of witnesses and victims of crime, including victims of terrorism, and particularly for child 
witnesses and victims, especially those who are unaccompanied or who need guardians. 

  Measures strengthening Member States administrative and operational capability to protect critical 

infrastructure in all economic sectors, including through public-private partnerships and improved 
coordination, cooperation, exchange and dissemination of know-how and experience within the EU and with 
relevant third countries. 

  Secure links and effective coordination between existing sector-specific early warning and crisis 

cooperation bodies at EU and national level, including situation centres, to (i) enable comprehensive and 
accurate overviews in crisis situations to be produced, (ii) coordinate response measures and (iii) share open, 
privileged and classified information. 

  Measures strengthening the EU’s and Member States’ administrative and operational capacities to 

develop comprehensive threat and risk assessments, which are evidence-based and consistent with priorities 
and initiatives identified at EU level. This is especially the case for those that have been endorsed by the 
European Parliament and the Council. This is so the EU can develop integrated approaches based on common 
and shared appreciations in crisis situations and strengthen mutual understanding of Member States’ and partner 
countries’ various definitions of threat levels. 

Beneficiaries of ISF-P 

12 

 
 
The  Fund’s  beneficiaries  include  federal  and  national  authorities,  local  public  bodies,  non-
governmental  organisations,  private  and  public  companies,  and  education  and  research 
organisations, to the extent that they are relevant for the Fund. 

Eligible actions 

The eligible actions under ISF-P are listed in Article 4 of the Specific Regulation. These include: 
(i) police  cooperation  and  coordination  between  law  enforcement  authorities,  (ii)  networking; 
(iii)  public-private  partnerships;  (iv)  mutual  confidence;  (v) 
learning,  exchange  and 
dissemination  of  know-how  and  best  practice;  (vi) information  sharing;  (vii)  interoperability; 
(viii) monitoring and evaluation; (ix) threat and risk impact assessments; (x) awareness raising; 
(xi) dissemination  and  communication;  (xii)  IT  systems  that  help  achieve  the  objectives;  and 
(xiii) training and education of staff and experts of relevant authorities. 

In  addition,  the  ISF-P  is  also  an  important  instrument  in  relation  to  and  in  third  countries  by 
supporting: 

o  police  cooperation  and  coordination  between  law  enforcement  authorities,  including 

joint investigation teams and any other form of cross-border joint operation; 

o  networking, mutual confidence, understanding and learning, identification, exchange and 
dissemination  of  know-how,  experience  and  best  practice,  information  sharing,  shared 
situation awareness and foresight, contingency planning and interoperability; and 

o 

training and education of staff and experts of relevant authorities. 

The  eligible  actions  under  technical  assistance  at  the  initiative  of  the  Commission  and  of 
Member  States  are  listed  in  Articles  9  and  20  of  the  Horizontal  Regulation.  These  include: 
expenditure relating to the preparation, selection, appraisal, management and monitoring of the 
programme,  actions  or  projects  or  to  (i) audits  and  on-the-spot  checks  (ii)  the  strengthening  of 
the  administrative  capacity;  (iii) information  and  dissemination;  and  (iv) computerised  systems 
for the management, monitoring and evaluation. 

Financial allocations, top-ups and management modes 

ISF-P is implemented through (i) shared management in shared responsibility with the Member 
States,  (ii) direct management by the Commission or (iii) indirect management by an entrusted 
third party. A more detailed description can be found in sub-chapter 3.1 on page 17. 

The total resources for ISF-P’s implementation period 2014-2020 have been initially estimated at 
EUR 1 004 million, are divided as follows: 

  EUR 662  million  or  66 %  of  the  total  amount,  managed  by  Member  States  under  the 

framework of multiannual national programmes (shared management); 

  EUR 342  million  or  34 %,  managed  by  the  Commission  through  annual  work 
programmes  focusing  on  union  actions,  emergency  assistance  (EMAS)  and  technical 
assistance at the initiative of the Commission (direct or indirect management). 

In response to the unforeseen security threats of recent years, most notably the terrorist attacks in 
many Member States, this budget was increased through a top-up of EUR 70 million to support 
Member States in  implementing the passenger name record directive and another one of EUR 22 

13 

 
million  for  developing  information  exchange  and  interoperability  tools.  As  a  result  of  this,  the 
present allocations of the national programmes currently amount to EUR 754 million. 

2.2.2  The intervention logic 

The diagram below, based on ISF-P’s legal basis, presents the key aspects of the functioning of 
the Fund, including the policy areas that  it covers and the specific needs and objectives  that it 
seeks to address, all in correlation with the EU resources allocated. In setting out the causal links 
between  ISF-P’s  activities,  outputs,  results  and  impacts,  the  intervention  logic  helps  to  clarify 
what the Fund is aiming to achieve, how it will achieve it and with what. The implementation 
process is further explained in Section 3.1. 

14 

 
 
 
15 

 
 
 
 
 
3  IMPLEMENTATION / STATE OF PLAY 

3.1  Description of the implementation process 

ISF-P is being implemented either by the Member States (shared management), directly by the 
Commission (direct management), or indirectly by entrusting the budget implementation task to 
a third party20 (indirect management). 

For shared management, at the beginning of the programming period, all Member States had a 
policy dialogue with the Commission to help them prepare their national programmes. Based on 
the  outcome  of  the  dialogues,  the  Member  States  have  proposed  their  multiannual  national 
programmes.  The  Commission  examined  these  programmes,  consulted  relevant  agencies  and 
eventually approved each national programme. 

To  implement  their  national  programmes,  Member  States  had  to  set  up  a  management  and 
control  system21.  The  Commission  follows  the  implementation  under  shared  management  by 
examining  the  annual  implementation  reports  and  accounts  submitted  yearly  by  the  Member 
States. 

Member  States  are  expected  to  submit  two  national  evaluation  reports:  an  interim  evaluation 
report by the end of 2017 and an ex post evaluation report by the end of 2023. The Commission 
takes these reports into account in its interim and ex post evaluations of the Fund which are sent 
to  the  European  Parliament,  to  the  Council  of  the  EU,  to  the  European  Economic  and  Social 
Committee and to the Committee of the Regions by 30 June 2018 and 20 June 2024 respectively. 

In light of the interim evaluation reports submitted by the Member States, and developments in 
EU  policies  and  in  the  Member  States,  a  mid-term  review  of  the  situation  is  planned  for  the 
middle of the programming period, i.e. 2018 (Art. 15 of the Horizontal Regulation). Based on the 
outcome,  the  national  programmes  can  be  revised  and  additional  available  resources  can  be 
allocated to those. 

A  small  amount  of  money  equal  to  5 %  of  the  total  national  allocation  plus  EUR 200 000  is 
reserved in the national programmes for technical assistance. 

Moreover,  each  Member  State  needs  to  establish  a  partnership  with  relevant  stakeholders 
including, other public authorities, international organisations, NGOs and social partners in order 
to  prepare,  implement,  monitor  and  evaluate  the  national  programmes.  Stakeholders  meet 
regularly in a monitoring committee set up to follow the national programme’s implementation22. 

Some  types  of  actions,  due  to  their  nature,  such  as  transnational  actions,  innovative  projects, 
support  to  civil  society  organisations,  and  actions  requiring  fast  mobilisation  of  funds  are 
implemented under direct management by the Commission. Indirect management is used by the 
Commission  to  delegate  tasks  to  EU  agencies,  international  organisations  and  civil  society 
organisations because they are best placed to carry out those activities and also because of the 
limited human and administrative resources available in the Commission11. 

20   These parties can be countries or the bodies they have designated, international organisations and their agencies. 
21   Horizontal Regulation (EU) 514/2014, Section 2. 
22   Article 20 of the Horizontal Regulation. 

16 

 
                                                 
The share of the budget managed by the Commission is subject to annual work programmes23 for 
union actions. This share comprises: 

  grants (awarded on the basis of open or restricted calls for proposals or directly); 

  procurement (awarded on the basis of calls for tender or framework contracts); and 

  delegation agreements (actions that are entrusted to third parties). 

The  projects  selected  receive  in  co-financing  a  maximum  of  90 %  of  the  eligible  costs.  The 
emergency assistance is considered a specific type of union actions. 

3.2  Description of the implementation status 

3.2.1  Shared management 

According  to  the  legal  base,  the  EU  contribution  initially  allocated  EUR 662  million  for  all 
national  programmes.  However,  after  the  2017  top-up  the  reprogrammed  amount  became 
EUR 754  million.  Such  top-up  included  EUR 70  million  to  support  Member  States  in 
implementing the passenger name record directive and EUR 22 million to increase and improve 
the development of information exchange and interoperability tools. 

By 31 December 201624, Member States had committed EUR 283.5 million of the total available 
EU  resources  for  2014-2020  for  national  programmes 
that  were  adopted,  with  an 
implementation rate of nearly 37.6 %. Total payments declared under accounts for 2014-2016 
amounted to EUR 63.5 million, resulting in a very low level of payments of 8.42 %25. 

Disaggregating data by the ISF-P specific objectives (SOs), resources have been earmarked for 
the  first  specific  objective  —  crime  (with  72 %  of  the  planned  EU  commitment/available  EU 
resources for adopted national programmes), followed by the second specific objective — risks 
and crisis (with 23 %), and technical assistance (with 5 %). 

23   The annual work programme is a planning document explaining how the budget allocated for certain policies or 

funding programmes will be spent. 

24   The  reference  period  for  shared  management  ran  from  January  2014  until  31  December  2016,  which 
corresponded to the period covered by the last set of accounts submitted by the Member States and cleared by 
the Commission. 

25 The level of payments varies widely between Member States. Possible reasons for such a low level of payments 
may  include:  late  approval  of  most  of  the  national  programmes,  complexity  and  length  of  national  public 
procurement rules, administrative burden (i.e. heavy reporting requirements) and low pre-financing rates. 

17 

 
                                                 
Figure 1: ISF-P allocations for the 2014-2020 under each specific objective (EUR million)

For specific objective — crime26, the Member States that spent the highest amounts on projects 
related to this objective are Germany, Spain, France and Italy with EUR 30, 18, 10 and 9 million 
respectively. Member States that spent the lowest amounts are Czech Republic, Greece, Croatia, 
Luxembourg,  Latvia  or  Slovakia,  with  projects  funded  for  less  than  one  million  euro. 
Furthermore, Poland has not provided any data under this indicator. 

For specific objective — risks and crisis27, Germany, Estonia and Netherlands are the Member 
States to have spent the highest amounts on projects related to this objective, with EUR 3.4, 3.2 
and  4.8  million  respectively.  The  remaining  21  Member  States  financed  projects  for  less  than 
EUR 3  million.  In  addition,  Croatia  and  Poland  have  not  provided  data  under  the  referred 
indicator. 

26   SFC2014, latest submission from the Member States as of February 2018. 
27   Ibid. 

18 

 
 
                                                 
Figure 2: Budgetary allocation by specific and operational objectives (in EUR million) 

Among  the  operational  objectives,  most  funds  —  EUR  247  million,  around  33 %  —  are 
allocated  to  strengthening  Member  States  capability  to  prevent  and  combat  crime.  The  second 
highest amount is allocated to actions under the operational objective ‘exchange of information’ 
under  both  specific  objectives  (‘crime  prevention’  and  ‘risks  and  crisis’),  with  a  total  of  EUR 
226  million,  around  29 %  of  all  national  programmes’  funds.  The  objectives  with  the  least 
allocations are the development of threat and risk assessment capacity and support for witnesses 
and victims of crime (about 3 % for each objective). 

In  terms  of  Member  States  commitments  by  action  type,  the  available  data  reflects  approved 
projects only. The table below summarises the distribution of funds by action type for approved 
projects in the national programmes. Over half of the approved funds (56 % for 168 projects) are 
allocated to the acquisition of IT equipment. Another quarter of the committed funds (25 % for 
101 projects) are allocated for equipment, covering a wide variety of national objectives, such as 
general  prevention  and  combating  of  crime,  drug  trafficking,  chemical,  biological, radiological 
and  nuclear  explosives  (CBRN-E),  and  cybercrime.  A  very  small  share  (10  projects  with  less 
than 1 % of the committed funds) is allocated to police cooperation and networks development. 

Figure 3: Committed funds by action type 

19 

 
 
 
The implementation rate describes the progress of Member States in launching specific actions to 
implement  their  national  programmes.  However,  the  implementation  rate  does  not  indicate 
the level of completion of the launched actions. 

The  level  of  payments  represents  the  amount  of  payments  made  by  the  Commission  to  a 
responsible  authority  implementing  a  national  programme  against  the  allocation  available  for 
that  same  country  for  the  2014-2020  period.  As  Member  States  are  free  to  choose  whether  to 
submit accounts after the projects end or during their implementation (e.g. when a certain phase 
of a project is completed), the level of payments does not necessarily reflect project progress. 

Figure  4:  Global  allocations  (2014-2020),  paid  amounts  by  the  Commission  (2014-2016)  (EUR  million)  and  implementation 
rate28 

A  review  of  the  level  of  payments  by  Member  States  indicates  that  only  four  countries  have 
payments  higher  than  20 %  (EE,  DE,  NL  and  AT),  while  10  Member  States  have  payments 
lower than 1 %29. 

However, considering that the annual accounts for 2017 were submitted by the Member States in 
mid-February 2018, we can conclude that the overall level of payments has increased by up to 
21 %,  with  Italy,  Romania,  Hungary,  Sweden,  Portugal,  Latvia  and  Ireland  and  many  other 
Member States making significant improvements as illustrated in the figure below. This shows, 
as  expected,  the  positive  and  drastic  increasing  trend  of  the  level  of  Fund  payments  for  the 
remaining implementation period. 

28   Ibid. 
29   SE, CZ, LV, PT, HR, EL, IE, MT, PL and RO. 

20 

 
 
                                                 
Figure 5: ISF-P payments 2015-2017 (EUR million) 

3.2.2  Direct and indirect management 

Under  direct  and  indirect  management,  the  Fund  is  centralised  at  the  European  Commission 
level.  The  Commission  approves  annual  work  programmes  that  define  the  priorities  and 
objectives for each year, including the priorities for the calls for proposals. They concern union 
actions30, and emergency assistance31. Applications for funding under union actions for instance 
are submitted online32 and applicants may take part in multiple calls either as an applicant or a 
co-applicant33. 

Overview of initial allocation of union actions as per annual work programmes and of the 
amounts actually awarded and spent 

A total amount of EUR 122.5 million was allocated for union actions and EUR 6.5 million for 
the emergency assistance as per the annual work programmes 2014-201634. Furthermore, of that 

30   Union  actions  are  managed  directly  by  the  Commission  through  grants  and  procurement  or  indirectly  via 
delegation agreements (e.g. with Europol). The total amount initially budgeted for the 2014-2020 period is EUR 
342 million. 

31   Emergency assistance is provided in response to crises. It can cover up to 100% of the eligible expenditure and is 
managed directly by the Commission. For the majority of emergency assistance actions covered, ISF-P granted 
95% of the cost of the project. However, this may reach 100% for some type of beneficiaries. 

32   Applications  for  grants  have  always  been  submitted  online:  2014  and  2015  annual  work  programmes  via 
Priamos, and as of 2016 via the DG Research and Innovation’s e-grants system. Applications must include the 
application form, a description of the action, and a budget estimate. 

33   Upon  award  and  during  the  implementation  of  funding  beneficiaries  are  required  to  report  on  the  project’s 
progress  by  submitting  a  mid-term  progress  report  including,  among  other  things,  information  on  the  results 
achieved  to  date,  any  obstacles,  and  any  delays.  When  the  project  is  completed,  beneficiaries  are  required  to 
submit a final technical implementation report which will include information on the results of the project, its 
impact and a description of the activities undertaken. 

34   The annual work programme 2017 was adopted in September 2017 and is thus outside the evaluation period. 

21 

 
 
 
 
                                                 
amount,  EUR 118.5  million  was  implemented  under  direct  management  and  EUR 10.5  under 
indirect management. 

Current data (2014-2016) on payments show that the main spending has been incurred for calls 
for proposals (62 %): 

Figure 6: Payments made as of December 2016 (EUR million) 

Calls for proposals 

The  overall  budget  for  calls  for  proposals  for  the  period  2014-2016  was  EUR 41.1  million, 
including open calls (EUR 36.7 million) and restricted ones (EUR 4.4 million). There were four 
calls for proposal in each of the first two years (2014 and 2015) and one call in 2016. The policy 
areas35 and the budgets for open calls are presented in the following figure: 

35   Based on Regulation (EU) 513/2014, Art. 8. 

22 

 
 
                                                 
Figure 7: Budgets for open calls 2014-2016 per policy area (EUR million) 

The distribution in the payments made so far among the several policy areas does not show any 
great  discrepancies.  The  economic,  financial,  corruption  and  environment  crimes  received  the 
highest  amount  paid  (EUR 4.7  million)  and  the  law  enforcement  training  the  lowest  (EUR 2.6 
million). Overall, nearly a total of EUR 29 million was paid out over the period 2014-2016. 

Direct awards 

The  budget  for  direct  awards  in  the  annual  work  programmes  for  the  period  2014-2016  is  for 
EUR 22.8 million, accounting for 18 % of all union actions. In the reference period, nine direct 
grants were awarded, for a total of EUR 12.6 million. Payments for the direct awards amounted 
to  EUR 9.1  million.  Beneficiaries  from  six  Member  States  (DE,  PT,  AT,  BE,  NL  and  SE) 
received direct awards. 

Procurement 

The budget for procurement in the 2014-2016 annual work programmes was EUR 49.3 million. 
By 30 June 2017, 207 procurement contracts and 9 administrative arrangements and service level 
agreements  were  signed  for  a  total  amount  of  EUR 38.8  million  with  corresponding  payments 
made for EUR 23.4 million, thus leading to an implementation rate of 60.3 %.  

Procurement essentially covers services that the Commission purchases directly and  due to the 
nature  of  procurement,  most  of  the  contractors  are  based  close  to  the  Commission’s 
headquarters. Therefore, contractors from only five Member States (NL, BE, FR, UK and DE) 
account for 99 % of the procurement contracts. 

Emergency assistance 

So far emergency assistance has been awarded in 2016 and 2017 for the following five projects: 

23 

 
 
  Belgian  Federal  Police  (maximum  grant  EUR 0.9  million,  2016)  —  for  tactical 

communication tool for special forces; 

  French  Ministry  of  Interior  (maximum  grant  EUR 0.9  million,  2016)  —  for  analytical 

system for video surveillance data;  

  Europol (maximum grant EUR 1.5 million, 2016) — hot spots training and deployment; 

  Belgian  Federal  Police  (maximum  grant  EUR 0.7  million,  2017)  —  for  increased 

explosives and firearms detection; and 

  Europol (maximum grant EUR 2.2 million, 2017) — hot spots training and deployment. 

24 

 
 
 
 
 
4  METHOD 

4.1  Short description of methodology 

This  interim  evaluation  assesses  how  the  Fund  has  worked  so  far  and  intends  to  inform  the 
national  authorities,  the  EU  institutions,  the  stakeholders  and  the  general  public  about  the  key 
achievements and limitations of ISF-P36. The evaluation includes the analysis of the legal base in 
relation to the needs and actions implemented and the key changes implemented under the ISF-P 
relative to its predecessors, as well as the outlook for the remaining implementation period 2017-
2020 — this is the summative dimension. 

The evaluation identifies several lessons learnt to inform the Commission and the Member States 
on how they could address weaknesses and overcome obstacles, to ensure that during the second 
half of the implementation period corrective measures are taken and their impact is minimised — 
this is the formative dimension (see also the key findings in Chapter 6 on page 53). This forward-
looking aspect of the evaluation will also contribute to the preparation of the next generation of 
funding instruments, post 2020. 

This  evaluation  of  ISF-P  has  been  carried  out  by  an  external  expert  group  and  has  been 
coordinated by the HOME Funds Evaluation Team in Unit E3 of the Commission’s Directorate-
General  for  Migration  and  Home  Affairs  (DG  HOME)  with  the  support  of  an  Inter-Service 
Steering Group comprising other Commission general directorates and services, which has met 
four times — on 24 October and 15 December 2017 and on 1 February and 8 March 2018. 

The external study of the interim evaluation started in September 2017 and has been guided by 
Terms  of  Reference  adopted  by  the  Commission.  It  has  been  based  on  the  following  data 
sources. 

  Legal acts of the Funds including: the specific regulations; the horizontal Regulation; and 

implementing and delegated acts.  

  Reports  from  the  Commission  to  the  European  Parliament  and  the  Council  on  the 

application of various directives and regulations. 

  National  programmes  of  the  participating  Member  States;  management  and  control 
systems,  annual  implementation  reports  and  annual  accounts;  and  the  national  interim 
evaluation report. 

  Union  actions:    Commission  annual  work  programmes;  grant  agreements  signed  with 
awarded  beneficiaries;  and  interim  and  final  reports  of  the  beneficiaries  having 
implemented union actions. 

  Emergency assistance: Commission annual work programmes for emergency assistance; 
grant agreements signed with awarded beneficiaries; and interim and final reports of the 
beneficiaries having implemented emergency assistance actions. 

  Reports  of  the  monitoring  visits  of  the  Commission  (shared  and  direct  management); 
audit reports drafted by the audit authorities of the Member States or by or on behalf of 
the Commission; 

36   For the implementation period 2014-2017. 

25 

 
                                                 
  Ex  post  evaluation  of  the  framework  programme  ‘Security  and  Safeguarding  Liberties 
(2007-2013) (SSL)’, composed of two programmes: ‘Prevention and Fight against Crime 
(ISEC)’; and ‘Prevention, Preparedness and Consequence Management of Terrorism and 
other Security-Related Risks (CIPS)’. 

  Relevant EU strategies, action plans, communications, recommendations; other relevant 

studies originating in the academic sector or produced by other institutions. 

  Reports  and  statistics  from  EU  agencies  operating  in  the  justice  and  home  affairs/ 

migration and security area; DG Migration and Home Affairs statistics; Eurostat. 

4.2  Evaluation questions37 

In  line  with  the  ‘Better  Regulation’  guidelines,  this  interim  evaluation  addresses  evaluation 
questions under each of the sections, which are structured around the five evaluation criteria of 
relevance, efficiency, effectiveness, coherence and EU added value. 

Effectiveness 

To what extent has the ISF-P reached its objectives? 

 How did the Fund contribute to the prevention of cross-border, serious and organised crime, including terrorism? 

- What  progress  was  made  towards  the  achievement  of  the  expected  results  of  strengthening  Member  States 

capability to combat cross-border, serious and organised crime? 

- What  progress  was  made  towards  developing  administrative  and  operational  coordination  and  cooperation 

among Member Sates public authorities, Europol or other relevant Union bodies? 

- What  progress  was  made  towards  developing  training  schemes  in  implementation  of  EU  training  policies, 

including through specific Union law enforcement exchange programmes? 

- What progress was made towards putting in place measures, safeguard mechanisms and best practices for the 

identification and support of witnesses and victims of crime? 

 How  did  the  Fund  contribute  to  improve  the  capacity  of  Member  States  to  manage  effectively  security-related 

risks and crises, and protecting people and critical infrastructure? 

- What  progress  was  made  towards  reinforcing  Member  States  administrative  and  operational  capability  to 

protect critical infrastructure in all sectors of economic activity? 

- What progress was made towards establishing secure links and effective coordination between existing sector-

specific early warning and crisis cooperation actors? 

- What progress was made towards improving the administrative and operational capacity of the Member States 

and the Union? 

Efficiency 

Were the general objectives achieved at reasonable cost? 

 To what extent were the results of the Fund achieved at reasonable cost in terms of deployed financial and human 

resources? 

 What measures were put in place to prevent, detect, report and follow up on cases of fraud and other irregularities? 

Relevance 

Did the objectives of the interventions correspond to the actual needs? 

 Did the objectives set by the Member States in the national programmes respond to the identified needs? 
 Did the objectives set in the annual work programmes for the union actions address the actual needs? 
 Did the objectives set in the annual work programmes for emergency assistance address the actual needs? 
 Which measures did the Member States put in place to address changing needs? 

Coherence 

Were the objectives set in the national programmes coherent with the ones 
set in other EU funded programmes (also during the implementation)? 

 Was  an  assessment  of  other  interventions  with  similar  objectives  carried  out  and  taken  into  account  during  the 

programming stage? 

 Were coordination mechanisms between the Fund and other interventions with similar objectives established for 

the implementing period? 

 Were the actions implemented through the Fund coherent with and non-contradictory to other interventions with 

37   The detailed evaluation questions are included in Annex 5. 

26 

 
 
                                                 
similar objectives? 

 Was the coherence ensured also of the Fund? 

Complementarity 

Were the objectives set in the national programme and the implemented 
actions complementary to those set in other policies? 

 Was an assessment of other interventions with complementary objectives carried out and taken into account during 

the programming stage? 

 Were  coordination  mechanisms  between  the  Fund  and  other  interventions  with  similar  objectives  established  to 

ensure their complementarity for the implementing period? 

 Were mechanisms aimed to prevent overlapping of financial instruments put in place? 

EU added value 

Was any value added brought about by the EU support? 

 What are the main types of added value resulting from the Fund support (volume, scope, role, process)? 
 Would the Member States have carried out the actions required to implement the EU policies without the financial 

support of the Fund? 

 What would be the most likely consequences of an interruption of the support? 
 To which extent have actions supported resulted in a benefit at the Union level? 

Sustainability 

Are the positive effects of the projects likely to last when the Fund support 
will be over? 

 What  were  the  main  measures  adopted  by  the  Member  States  to  ensure  the  sustainability  of  the  results  of  the 

projects (both at programming and implementation stage)? 

 Were mechanisms put in place to ensure a sustainability check at programming and implementation stage? 
 To what extent are the outcomes/benefits of the actions sustained by the Fund expected to continue thereafter? 
Simplification and reduction 
of administrative burden 

Were the management procedures simplified and the administrative burden 
reduced for its beneficiaries? 

 Did  the  innovative  procedures  introduced  (simplified  cost  option,  multiannual  programming,  national  eligibility 
rules, more comprehensive national programmes allowing for flexibility, operating support and STS for LT) bring 
about simplification for the beneficiaries of the Fund? 

4.3  Limitations and robustness of findings 

Limitation 1 

The first limitation of this evaluation concerns its timing: it is taking place only three years after 
the  ISF-P  was  launched.  Due  to  the  late  approval  and  slow  implementation  of  the  national 
programmes evaluating the cost-effectiveness of the actions has been challenging, since most of 
the  projects  are  still  ongoing  or  have  only  very  recently  begun  to  be  implemented.  Funding 
consumed under the national programmes38 at the time of this evaluation represent only 8.42 % 
of  the  total  funding  allocated  so  far,  while  the  average  implementation  rate  was  37.7 %.  The 
evidence  on  the  Fund’s  results  and  impact  is  thus  very  limited.  It  is  also  not  possible  to 
definitively measure the sustainability of the effects of actions, as many of them are still being 
implemented. Thus, for these reasons this evaluation is not expected nor is it able to produce a 
full picture of the programme’s results and impacts nor can it draw final conclusions. 

Mitigation 

Only data that were available were considered for this evaluation. Furthermore, tangible results 
through case studies, interviews and general and relevant project documentation were analysed. 
Moreover,  to  determine  the  sustainability  of  effects  of  actions,  the  likelihood  of  actions 
continuing has been assessed instead. 

38   In this context it is worth noting that Ireland has not submitted its national ISF evaluation report. Therefore it 

was not possible to include Ireland in this evaluation. 

27 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
                                                 
Limitation 2 

There have been a lack of benchmarks to compare performance, mainly because AMIF and ISF 
are the first home affairs programmes to have a common monitoring and evaluation framework 
(CMEF) and a set of indicators (common, result and impact). At the same time, the stakeholders 
consider that the relevant indicators could be further improved. There has been a lack of quality 
in the data and in the Member States annual implementation reports, partly because the common 
monitoring  and  evaluation  framework  and  all  the  guidance  arrived  later  in  the  process  (early 
2017). 

Mitigation 

In this case, the national programmes and the national interim evaluation reports have provided 
the  needed  policy  and  performance  baseline.  Moreover,  statistics  on  crime  (mainly  from 
Eurostat)  have  been  a  useful  tool  to  assess  the  development  of  the  different  crime  typologies 
before 2014 and during the implementation period being evaluated here. 

Limitation 3 

There  have  been  issues  related  to  data  availability  and  measurability  of  impacts  (for  example, 
most of ISF-P indicators focus on outputs). Often, these indicators are not linked to the Fund’s 
specific  objectives;  hence  it  is  difficult  to  attribute  the  observed  changes  to  the  Fund.  The 
information gathered through primary sources is limited, since stakeholders have no clear idea of 
the results brought about by the Fund. The information focuses more on procedural issues, and is 
providing  a  very  general  perspective  on  the  Fund’s  implementation,  with  sporadic  examples 
found on the ground. 

Mitigation 

In order to counter this issue, the evaluation has used other sources of evidence and triangulation 
techniques to assess the soundness of the value of the indicators reported. Also, indicators were 
not included in the evaluation whenever they were not considered to be strong enough and could 
alter the interim assessment.  

Limitation 4 

Concerning  the  open  public  consultation  provided  for  in  the  Better  Regulation  guidelines,  the 
Commission has worked on the future multi-annual financial framework in clusters setting up a 
streamlined  consultation39  that  covered  both  forward  and  backward  looking  questions. 
Launching a specific consultation for the interim evaluations could have created confusion and 
not provided much added value compared to the broader exercise. 

Mitigation 

The  open  public  consultation  for  the  interim  evaluation  was  therefore  replaced  by  a  targeted 
consultation  (involving  beneficiaries  of  union  actions)  which  was  eventually  used  to 
contextualise the findings. This consultation received input from 23 participants. 

39   Open Public Consultation: 155 responses submitted. 

‘Support  to  the  preparation  of  the  next  generation  of  EU  Funds  in  the  Home  Affairs,  Synopsis  Report  on  the 
stakeholder consultation’ E&Y, February 2018. (Not made public yet). 

28 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
                                                 
 
Overall,  DG  HOME  has  thus  tried  to  mitigate  these  limitations  as  much  as  possible,  by 
transparently providing the data sources, all of which are made publicly available. Conclusions 
are then drawn, where possible, based on the triangulation of evidence from various data sources. 
Whenever  possible,  the  ex  post  evaluation  of  the  preceding  programmes  ISEC  and  CIPS  has 
been used as a benchmark. 

5  ANALYSIS AND ANSWERS TO THE EVALUATION QUESTIONS 

5.1  How effective has ISF-P been so far? 

This question aims to provide an insight into whether ISF-P is on track to meeting its objectives. 
The Fund has two specific objectives: one linked to crime prevention — combating cross-border, 
serious and organised crime including terrorism and the other to managing security-related risks 
and crises. 

In a nutshell 

The  Fund  has  contributed  to  a  high  level  of  security  in  the  EU  by  means  of  preventing  and 
combating  cross-border,  serious  and  organised  crime,  including  terrorism,  and  strengthening 
coordination  and  cooperation  between  law  enforcement  authorities.  It  has  also  contributed  to 
improving Member States’ capability to manage security-related risks and crises effectively and, 
to  a  lesser  extent,  by  protecting  people  and  critical  infrastructures  against  terrorist  attacks  and 
other security-related incidents. 

Available evidence indicates that the Fund has helped to improve cooperation and coordination 
among Member States and European bodies, and towards improving Member States’ capability 
to  develop  comprehensive  threat  and  risk  assessments,  although  the  number  of  ISF-P  funded 
projects at national and EU level is relatively low. 

With regard to union actions, several actions have been initiated in the area of early warning and 
cooperation on crisis prevention (e.g. the ATLAS network). 

However,  the  Fund  has  made  limited  progress  so  far  towards  (i) boosting  Member  States 
administrative and operational capability to protect critical infrastructure, (ii) protecting victims, 
and (iii) developing training schemes and exchange programmes. Furthermore, it has only made 
limited  progress  with  third  countries  and  international  organisations,  although  most  projects 
concerning these operational objectives are still ongoing. 

The Fund has helped the EU to attain a higher level of security in the Union. This has been done 
via  the  achievements  on  its  two  specific  objectives  and  in  particular,  the  achievement  of  the 
seven operational objectives. 

The  Fund  has  helped  reduce  the  prevalence  of  cross-border  ‘classic  crime  areas’  in  the  EU  as 
proved by the contextual crime indicators, while the incidence of new crime areas (e.g. financial 
and economic crime, cybercrime) has increased. The exact extent to which ISF-P is accountable 
for  these  changes  cannot  be  shown.  However,  a  qualitative  assessment  could  show  that  the 
preceding  ISEC  and  CIPS  programmes  as  well  as  ISF-P  contributed  to  the  reduction  of  cross-
border crime by means of: (i) better equipped and trained law enforcement officers, (ii) more and 
better exchange of information through various networks and structures and IT systems as well 
as (iii) the acquisition of technical equipment. 

29 

 
 
In  addition,  the  Fund  has  made  progress  towards  improving  how  current  EU  policies  and 
instruments  are  applied  and  implemented  (e.g.  passenger  name  record  directive,  Prüm  Council 
Decision on automated data exchange, biometric data capture and exchange, and interconnection 
with the systems of Justice and Home Affairs agencies). 

Compared to ISEC and CIPS, an important change ISF-P introduced was the new objective of 
strengthening  Member  States  capabilities.  Furthermore,  ISF-P  is  structurally  different  from  its 
predecessor programmes, since around 40 % of all projects under the national programmes (169 
of 419), in terms of the type of action, were focused on IT equipment or other equipment while 
only 10 projects were focused on police cooperation and networking40. Taking this into account, 
ISF-P has contributed to the operational exchange of information through IT systems and, to a 
lesser extent, to other forms of transnational exchange and cooperation, which was the key focus 
of its predecessor programmes. Due to this structural difference in the focus of the programmes, 
it  is  not  possible  to  establish  a  ‘like-to-like’  comparison.  Both  exchange  of  information  and 
cooperation and improving operational capabilities are complementary and are key components 
that contribute to greater security in the EU. 

ISF-P  helped  strengthen  the  coordinated  response  against  threats  and  crises  and  bolster  the 
capability  of  Member  States  in  the  fields  of  threat  and  risk  assessment,  early  warning  systems 
and protection of critical infrastructure. In order to protect critical infrastructure, most measures 
focused  on  strengthening  operational  capability  in  case  of  terrorist  attacks,  including  those 
involving  chemical,  biological,  radiological  and  nuclear  explosive  substances,  mostly  through 
training law enforcement officials, acquiring highly specialised equipment and IT software and 
tools,  and  improving  coordination  between  stakeholders.  In  addition,  several  Member  States 
prioritised  the  development  of  training  schemes  and  the  establishment  of  national  training 
capacities  for  future  cross-sectoral  training  of  all  stakeholders  involved  in  managing  risks  and 
crises. 

Likewise,  a  significant  number  of  Member  States  implemented  actions  which  focused  on 
establishing  secure  links  and  effective  coordination  between  existing  sector-specific  early 
warning and crisis cooperation actors, including (i) the development or upgrade of warning-alert 
systems and  (ii) improving coordination between different authorities and with  other countries, 
notably to strengthen cybersecurity. 

However,  the  Fund  has  only  made  limited  progress  towards  strengthening  mutual  trust  among 
Member  States  law  enforcement  agencies  (usually  through  relationship  building  during  joint 
training, exchange programmes and participation in union actions, and operational cooperation). 
These types of actions were either not fully implemented by the national programmes or reduced 
in volume compared to the Fund’s predecessor programmes. Also, ISF-P has only made limited 
progress in protecting victims of crime and in protecting people and critical infrastructure against 
terrorist  attacks  and  other  security-related  incidents.  Nevertheless,  the  vast  majority  of 
stakeholders interviewed stated that the project outputs and results are expected to be delivered 
in line with the resources and activities set out. Therefore, it is expected that ISF-P will achieve 
its objectives by the end of the programming period (i.e. 2020). 

Strengthen Member States capability to combat cross-border, serious and organised crime 

Under the national programmes, some progress has been made in strengthening Member States’ 
capabilities to combat cross-border, serious and organised crime, including terrorism, as the vast 

40   This is not an exact categorisation as some projects may have had more than one focus area. 

30 

 
                                                 
majority  of  Member  States  have  implemented  or  are  in  the  process  of  carrying  out  projects 
related to this objective. On average about four projects are carried out by each Member State, 
mainly  in  the  fields  of  financial  and  economic  crime,  cybercrime,  illicit  drug  trafficking  and 
terrorist threats. These projects involve improving operational infrastructures, as well as mutual 
cooperation41.  As  nearly  all  of  these  projects  are still  ongoing,  and  even  if  some  projects  have 
already  produced  results  and  have  led  or  contributed  to  positive  effects,  it  is  still  too  early  to 
measure the overall impact of ISF-P42. 

technological  and  management 

Furthermore,  Member  States  have  also  used  ISF-P  funds  to  respond  quickly  to  needs  on  the 
ground by investing in IT systems and renewal of operational equipment which aimed to upgrade 
and increase the operational capability to prevent and combat cross-border, serious and organised 
crime,  especially  drug  trafficking  and  terrorism.  As  to  improving  IT  systems,  acquisitions 
solutions, 
included 
telecommunication  interception  systems,  and  computers.  Other  investments  were  made  on 
technical equipment, such as mobile analysis laboratories, forensic tools and narcotics analysers. 
Finally,  equipment  such  as  special  vehicles,  drones  and  protective  vests  and  equipment  was 
purchased, some of which have already been put into practice (EE, FR and SI). To prevent cross-
border  and  organised  crime,  automatic  number  plate  recognition  systems  have  been  installed 
(EE, ES and FR). 

systems,  network  devices, 

IT 

In addition, with the support of ISF-P, Member States have improved their mutual cooperation to 
investigate  and  counter  cross-border,  serious  and  organised  crime,  including  terrorism. 
Cooperation  took  place  by  way  of  (i)  exchanging  information  on  cross-border  crime, 
(ii) establishing  transnational  networks  and  projects,  and  (iii)  Member  States  participating  in 
joint  investigation  teams  (JITs)  and  the  European  multidisciplinary  platform  against  criminal 
threats  (EMPACT)  policy  cycle.  For  instance,  thematic  networks  allowed  for  operational 
practices to be exchanged on money laundering (AMON network in ES), anti-corruption (AT), 
police  information  and  analysis  (DE),  cooperation  centres  and  centres  of  excellence  on 
cybercrime,  and  asset  recovery.  Five  Member  States  (AT,  BE,  DE,  FI  and  SI)  invested  in 
projects  involving  the  exchange  of  information  and  practices  to  counter  extremism  and 
radicalisation. 

National actions financed by ISF-P have  also contributed to improving human capabilities  and 
human resources, especially by financing the training and hiring of additional staff. 

In terms of results, the above actions funded under shared management led to the disruption of 
organised  crime  groups,  especially  through:  (i)  seizures  of  cash  (EE  and  FR),  (ii) the  taking 
down of websites (FR), (iii) arrests (DE, FR and MT), (iv) seizures of stolen goods (DE and EE) 
and (v) seizures of drugs, heroin and cocaine (BG, EE, ES, FI and MT). 

The  union  actions’  projects  have  helped  strengthen  Member  States  capabilities  to  prevent  and 
fight against serious, transnational crime as well as improve cooperation. ISF-P funds supported 

41   Financial and economic crime, such as: (i) corruption, money laundering, financing of terrorism (AT, CZ, EE, 
FI, HU, LT, PT, SE and SI), (ii) proceeds of crime (NL and SE); (iii) cybercrime (AT, CY, CZ, ES, FI, FR, HU, 
LT, LV and SI); (iv) illicit drug trafficking (BG, CZ, EE, ES, FR and HU); (v) trafficking in human beings (BG, 
HU and SI); (vi) terrorist threats and radicalisation (BG, DE, EE, ES, FR, MT and SE); (vii) organised property 
crime (AT and DE); (viii) illegal importation and exportation (MT); and (ix) environmental crime (FR and SI). 
42   It is also too early to assess the results of such action as the programme’s implementation got off to a slow start 
and the impacts may take up to three years to materialise. In addition, in the case of some Member States (IE, SE 
and SI), due to the confidential nature of sensitive operations carried out, details of the activities could not be 
disclosed  to  the  evaluators,  who  therefore  could  not  report  on  how  such  actions  were  implemented,  nor  their 
effectiveness. 

31 

 
                                                 
projects in a number of different areas, in particular on radicalisation, cybercrime and trafficking 
in  human  beings.  This  was  mainly  achieved  through  gathering  and  sharing  knowledge  on  a 
specific crime topic by conducting research and creating networks and databases. Other projects 
intended  to  strengthen  operation  capability  through  police  cooperation,  awareness-raising 
activities and training law enforcement officials. 

The Fund’s predecessor programmes ISEC and CIPS helped to stimulate, promote and develop 
cross-cutting methods for preventing and fighting crime. Improved networking and cooperation 
between authorities across Member States was identified as one of ISEC’s main results (building 
trust,  increasing  Member  States  motivation  to  work  together  and  ‘improved  Community 
feeling’). 

It is expected that the union actions of ISF-P will contribute to improving cooperation to a lower 
extent  when  compared  to  ISEC  and  CIPS  as  the  amount  of  funding  allocated  to  union  actions 
under  ISF-P  is  a  third  of  that  allocated  under  its  predecessor  programmes.  However,  if 
accounting  for  the  entire  ISF-P  (including  shared  management),  provided  that  projects  are 
implemented as expected, the Fund’s contribution is expected to be much greater as developing 
and  using  IT  systems  for  exchanging  information  and  other  operational  state-of-the-art 
equipment is likely to achieve a more transformational change across all Member States (rather 
than  support  single  projects  with  participants  from  only  a  few  Member  States  as  in  ISEC  and 
CIPS). 

Improve  Member  States  and  EU  capability  to  develop  comprehensive  threat  and  risk 
assessments 

Ten Member States43 have already implemented or are about to implement actions improving the 
administrative  and  operational  capability  in  order  to  develop  comprehensive  threat  and  risk 
assessments. Therefore, ISF-P is on the right track towards achieving this operational objective. 
Projects  have  focused  on:  (i)  protecting  critical  infrastructure  (AT,  BG,  EE  and  FI); 
(ii) developing  information  systems  and  knowledge  relating  to  explosives  (EE,  ES  and  NL); 
(iii) training  on  the  identification  of  possible  ‘foreign  fighters’  (EL);  and  (iv)  developing 
analyses on chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear explosive threats (EE, IT and LU). 

The union actions have helped develop comprehensive threat and risk assessments, particularly 
relating to radicalisation and chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear explosives threats. At 
least  two-thirds  of  stakeholders  consulted  thought  that  actions  under  both  shared  and  direct 
management modes are achieving their objectives. 

More than 60 % of all CIPS-funded projects focused on developing frameworks, methodologies, 
tools and approaches for risk assessment at a sectoral level. To ensure the effectiveness of risk 
assessment, the ‘cascading effect’ of common infrastructures needs to be taken into account in 
order  to  prevent  and  reduce  the  consequences  of  security  incidents.  The  critical  infrastructures 
are interdependent within different sectors, and if these interdependencies are not well assessed 
and  considered  this  may  lead  to  catastrophic  cascading  failures  and  domino  effects.  Compared 
with CIPS, ISF-P has managed to develop more comprehensive threat and risk assessments by 
focusing  further  on  such  interdependencies  and  cascading  effects  in  case  of  disruption  and 
destruction of critical infrastructures during terrorist attacks, and by ensuring the adaptability of 
outputs to other sectors and to a large-scale implementation. 

Coordination and cooperation among Member States, Europol or other relevant EU bodies 

43   AT, BG, EL, EE, ES, FI, IT, NL, LU and RO. 

32 

 
                                                 
In order to develop administrative and operational coordination and cooperation among Member 
States  public  authorities,  Europol  or  other  relevant  EU  bodies,  the  funded  actions  focused  on 
establishing  improved  cooperation  and  coordination  structures.  This  was  mainly  achieved 
through  developing 
law 
enforcement applications, as well as developing platforms to exchange information. In particular, 
Member States used the Fund to comply with their obligations related to implementing EU legal 
instruments such as the passenger name record (PNR) directive44. 

interconnections  between  databases  and 

information  systems, 

Most of the Member States have used ISF-P funds to carry out projects that aim to achieve this 
operational  objective,  with  an  average  of  three  projects  per  Member  State.  Two-thirds  of 
stakeholders consulted believe that this objective is on track to being attained. 

Positive contributions towards effective coordination and cooperation are noted mostly through 
the  following  measures:  (i)  setting  up  structures  and  centralised  information  systems  to  enable 
information  exchange  to  take  place  (DE,  EL  FI,  FR,  HR,  IT,  LV,  LT  and  PT);  (ii)  enabling 
access  to  operational  databases  and  ensuring  IT  systems  are  interconnected  (BG,  IE  and  MT); 
(iii) improving  data  exchange,  especially  in  order  to  implement  the  Prüm  treaty45  and  the 
passenger  name  record  directive;  and  (iv)  strengthening  coordination  and  cooperation 
mechanisms between law enforcement authorities and Europol (HU and LT). 

Furthermore, ISF-P funds have been used to improve firearms control (BG, DE, FR and PL) and 
to  help  Member  States  meet  their  obligations  under  the  passenger  name  record  directive  (BE, 
CZ, EE, ES, FR, LU, PL and SE) through the implementation of feasibility studies, developing 
the  passenger  information  unit  (PIU)  application,  and  modernising  the  IT  infrastructure  and 
security environments46. The exchange of relevant passenger name record data among Member 
States  and  with  Europol  will  ensure  better  cooperation  between  national  authorities  and  will 
reduce security gaps. 

ISF-P has also supported several national projects that are helping to implement the EU policy 
cycle. Some of these projects involve: (i) providing IT equipment for forensics experts who are 
helping  to  prepare  SOCTA47  (BG);  (ii) carrying  out  a  feasibility  study  on  implementing  a 
national  criminal  intelligence  model  (LV);  (iii) police  experts  participating  in  operational 
meetings  (CZ);  (iv)  enabling  the  better  use  of  SIENA48  and  the  Europol  Information  System 
(EIS) to support the exchange of information between Europol and national units (DE, IT, PL, SI 
and  SK);  and  (v) supporting  joint  investigation  teams  (JITs)  (AT,  DE,  FI,  LT,  PT  and  SI)  that 
focus on different crime areas (FI). 

A  small  number  of  projects  have  focused  on  cooperation  with  third  countries.  However,  the 
limited scale of those is unlikely to generate significant results. 

44   It  refers  to  the  the  Member  States  obligation  to  implement  the  Directive  (EU)  2016/681  with  regard  to  the 
prevention,  detection,  investigation  or  prosecution  of  terrorist  offences  or  serious  crimes.  For  instance,  the 
Member  States  should  establish  the  passenger  information  units  (PIUs)  which  are  responsible  for  exchanging 
both passenger name record data and the results of processing this data between them and with Europol, as well 
as, under specific conditions, with third countries. 

45   The Prüm treaty aims to develop international cooperation between the Member States regarding the exchange of 

data. 

46   The  passenger  name  record  data  can  be  used  for  preventing  as  well  as  investigating  and  prosecuting  terrorist 
offences. By processing these data against predetermined criteria and relevant databases, national authorities can 
obtain valuable information concerning people who might be involved in criminal activities such as terrorism, 
drugs trafficking, trafficking in human beings, child sexual exploitation and other serious crimes. 

47   Serious and Organised Crime Threat Assessment. 
48   Secure Information Exchange Network Application. 

33 

 
                                                 
The  union  actions  focused  mainly  or  partly  on  developing  or  improving  administrative  and 
operational  coordination  and  cooperation  in  different  thematic  areas  among  Member  States 
public  bodies  and  with  Europol,  and  other  relevant  EU  agencies,  such  as  Frontex,  and 
international bodies, such as Interpol. These projects aim, among other things, to facilitate and 
standardise the exchange of information and data. 

The Fund’s predecessor programmes ISEC and CIPS helped develop more stable transnational 
cooperation  between  Member  States  and  their  agencies,  as  well  as  better  exchange  of 
information, particularly in the field of forensics, drugs, passenger name record, cybercrime and 
trafficking in human beings. ISF-P is building upon the projects started in ISEC and CIPS and 
continuing with some of the actions started through these programmes, such as passenger name 
record and exchange of information under the the Prüm treaty. 

Secure links and effective coordination between existing sector-specific early warning and 
crisis cooperation actors 

The majority of Member States have implemented actions focused on establishing secure links 
and effective coordination between existing sector-specific early warning and crisis cooperation 
actors.  Some  delays  in  implementing  ongoing  projects  were  reported  due  to  the  following 
reasons:  complexity  of  some  projects  leading  to  revisions  (NL,  LU  and  SK),  or  manufacture-
related (FR), operational (AT) or coordination (EE) issues. 

ISF-P has funded the following main types of actions under this operational objective: 

 

improvement of coordination between different departments, units, authorities, including 
with other countries (AT, ES and FI); 

  development or upgrade of warning-alert systems (DE and NL); 

 

technical upgrade and acquisition of further equipment (AT, EE, FR, LU and LV); and 

  development  of  structures  and  systems  related  to  cybersecurity  in  order  to  establish 

secure links (AT, CZ and EE). 

Furthermore,  ISF-P  has  also  implemented  actions  aimed  at  establishing  an  international  centre 
for  intelligence  or  other  major  events  (AT),  carrying  out  a  feasibility  study  on  establishing  a 
coast guard centre for managing security incidents (BE) and developing a preventive model for 
security at universities (FI). 

A key union action has been implemented under this operational objective to support the ATLAS 
network49,  which  aims  to  strengthen  the  preparedness  and  effectiveness  of  special  intervention 
units through exercises and other cross-border exchanges, including in crisis situations and the 
acquisition and sharing of tactical equipment to support special operations. 

Through procurement, ISF-P funds were used to ensure the operations of Commission's secure 
zone  (through  maintenance,  gradual  upgrade,  accreditation  of  IT  systems  and  project 
management  support)  as  secure  environment  for  supporting  (i) information  exchange  with 
EEAS,  Europol,  and  Frontex,  (ii)  crisis  management  and  risk  assessment  and  (iii) strategic 
analysis. 

49   ATLAS network is a cooperation structure between special intervention units in the EU. 

34 

 
                                                 
With  regard  to  the  contribution  of  CIPS  Programme,  similarly  as  in  the  ISF-P,  the  role  of  the 
Joint Research Centre was prominent  in  implementing  these types of actions.  CIPS had strong 
geographical imbalance and limited participation of Member States. As such, the role of ISF-P is 
expected to be a bit more prominent, although only 23 % of national programmes’ total funding 
has been allocated to the second specific objective (risks and crises). 

Strengthening Member States administrative and operational capability to protect critical 
infrastructure in all sectors of economic activity 

Despite  the  expected  number  of  tools  put  in  place  to  enable  the  protection  of  critical 
infrastructure, Member States did not reach the target in this area. Although actions have been 
implemented slowly at national level50 and most of the projects are still ongoing, five  Member 
States (AT, EE, ES, FR and SI) implemented projects on protecting critical infrastructure, which 
have already been completed and provided shown some results. 

Projects financed by ISF-P were mainly focused on:  

 

improving  cooperation  between  relevant  stakeholders  and  operators  of  critical 
infrastructure  in  the  case  of  terrorist  or  chemical,  biological,  radiological  and  nuclear 
explosives attacks, including the training of law enforcement officials (AT, CY, EE, EL, 
ES, FI, FR, HU, NL, MT, RO and SE); and 

  acquiring  protective  and  preventive  equipment  for  police  forces  or  special  rescue  units 

(BE, CY, CZ, EE, FI, FR, HU and LV). 

The achievement of these projects’ objectives was sought through: (i) improving the information 
systems  (EE  and  SI);  (ii) developing  emergency  response  communication  strategies  (DE  and 
MT); (iii) developing new security concepts (BE, SE and NL) and increasing security at airports 
(CZ  and  FR);  (iv) establishing  an  event  management  centre  (HU);  and  (v) increasing 
cybersecurity (NL and PT). 

Similarly, also in response to the recent context of increased security challenges and threats, the 
union  actions  presented  the  protection  and  resilience  of  critical  infrastructure  from  chemical, 
biological,  radiological  and  nuclear  explosive  materials  as  a  high  priority.  The  Joint  Research 
Centre  (JRC)  has  played  an  active  role  in  implementing  the  European  programme  for  critical 
infrastructure  protection  (EPCIP),  in  supporting  the  European  Reference  Network  for  Critical 
Infrastructure  Protection  (ERNCIP)  and  in  assessing  and  validating  the  modelling  tools  and 
decision  support  systems  addressing  chemical,  biological,  radiological  and  nuclear  explosives 
releases. Nevertheless, with the exception of the ERNCIP, the number of actions, their scope and 
the number of participants has remained limited. If actions related to ‘infrastructure’ continue to 
be implemented at a slow pace, the ISF-P is unlikely to achieve its operational objective related 
to critical infrastructure protection. 

Also in 2015, the Commission launched a call for proposals to support the implementation of the 
EU  chemical,  biological,  radiological  and  nuclear  explosives  action  plan  on  strengthening  the 
security  of explosives  and  the  EPCIP.  Actions  focused  on  protecting  critical infrastructure  and 
training law enforcement practitioners. 

50   Delays  in  the  submission  of  reports;  delays  due  to  limited  staff  and  resources  available  to  public  authorities; 
delays in the RA’s audits and verifications of projects; delays in the conduct of the required tender procedures. 

35 

 
                                                 
Measures,  safeguard  mechanisms  and  best  practices  for  identifying  and  supporting 
witnesses and victims of crime and terrorism 

The actions implemented have focused on victims of human trafficking, followed by victims of 
terrorism  and  of  child  abuse,  domestic  violence,  drug  trafficking  and  financial  crimes.  For  the 
type of actions, Member States put in place measures that aimed to raise awareness and provide 
information to crime victims, and combat human and sex worker trafficking (AT, EE, ES, MT, 
RO  and  SE51),  support  crime  victims  and  witnesses  in  courts  (CZ  and  FI52)  and  protect  them 
through  different  programmes  (AT,  CZ,  FI  and  MT),  and  boost  law  enforcement  training  on 
crime victim support (NL53, MT54 and RO).  

Furthermore, a lot of ISF-P funded actions are directly or indirectly related to implementing the 
Directive  establishing  minimum  standards  on  the  rights,  support  and  protection  for  victims  of 
crime55 (FI, MT, NL and SE). 

Under  union  actions,  limited  progress  has  been  made  to  reach  this  objective  during  the 
evaluation  period,  notably  mid-term  outputs  so  far,  since  most  projects  are  still  in  the 
implementation  phase.  The  relevant  projects  concern  mainly  victims  of  trafficking  in  human 
beings (THB), victims of financial and economic crime, and whistle-blowers. These actions aim 
to provide victim assistance and carry out awareness-raising activities.  

Project coordinators considered that ISF-P has  contributed to achieving this objective,  but  to  a 
moderate  extent  (25%56).  Four  interviewees  of  projects  at  national  and  Union  level  stated  that 
progress has been achieved with regard to supporting victims of crime.  

Training 

ISF-P  has  supported  Member  States  in  making  progress  towards  developing  training  schemes, 
helping to boost professional skills and knowledge in several relevant policy areas. The majority 
of  Member  States  have  programmed  and  are  implementing  measures  focusing  on  training,  in 
particular  in  the  fields  of  cybercrime,  trafficking  in  human  beings,  drug  trafficking  and 
corruption. In contrast, training schemes to help Member States fulfil their obligations on human 
rights and fundamental freedoms have been least prominent. Furthermore, some Member States 
have  focused on developing  technical and operational skills, including  on operating equipment 
such as drones and IT software. 

51   The Crime Victim Compensation and Support Authority in Sweden is developing an interactive website to make 

relevant information to victims easily accessible and comprehensible. 

52   The IT systems of the justice administration that deal with crime victim compensation in Finland were renewed. 
The  system  is  in  place  and  the  effect  is  that  payment  are  able  to  be  coordinated  towards  supporting  crime 
victims. 

53   The Netherlands carried out training for law enforcement officials in order for them to provide effective victim 

support. 

54   Malta’s law enforcement launched a victim support unit in April 2017. The aim of this unit is to provide victims 
of  crime  with  access  to  support  services  and  increase  their  participation  in  protection  programmes.  Also,  an 
awareness-raising  campaign  targeted  law  enforcement  officials  to  make  better  known  the  adopted  standard 
procedures when working with victims of crime.  

55   Directive 2012/29/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 25 October 2012 establishing minimum 
standards on the rights, support and protection of victims of crime, and replacing Council Framework Decision 
2001/220/JHA (OJ L 315 of 14 November 2012). 

56   Surveyed  Project  coordinators  of  Union  actions  and  under  the  National  Programmes:  9  out  of  38  respondents 
agreed with the statement that their project made a significant or very significant impact in this area. Surveyed 
project  co-beneficiaries  of  Union  actions:  3  out  of  12  different  partners  agreed  with  the  statement  that  their 
project made a significant or very significant impact in this area. 

36 

 
                                                 
As  of  June  2017,  more  than  11 000  law  officials  have  been  trained  since  2014  compared  to  a 
target  of  about  128 000.  If  Member  States  continue  implementing  actions  at  the  current  pace, 
they are unlikely to achieve the training targets by the end of the period. 

While  a  significant  number  of  national  actions  tended  to  focus  on  boosting  law  enforcement 
officers’  professional  skills  to  tackle  new  or  emerging  threats  as  well  as  serious  cross-border 
crimes,  some  training  schemes  aimed  to  improve  their  technical  skills,  such  as  operational, 
technological,  software,  and  forensic  skills.  Other  training  schemes  were  carried  out  as  an 
integral part of a larger project within the realm of ISF-P, and they helped boost the participants’ 
professional skills and knowledge (DE, NL and FR). 

In summary, the training is expected to result in the expertise of police officers and investigators 
being  strengthened,  hence  helping  law  enforcement  authorities  to  carry  out  their  work  more 
effectively. While it is too early at this stage to measure the results of the projects, the collected 
evidence shows that progress is being made — despite a slower than anticipated start — in many 
Member States. 

Under union actions, limited progress has been made towards developing training schemes since 
most  projects  are  still  in  the  implementation  phase.  However,  there  was  a  call  concerning  law 
enforcement  training  (LETX)  in  the  annual  work  programme  2015.  About  half  of  the 
stakeholders consulted claimed that training activities were not part of their projects. 

The union actions that were relevant to training focused on a wide range of topics, especially in 
conjunction with the aim of strengthening the capability to prevent and combat crime, including 
terrorism,  most  notably  on:  (i) counter-terrorism,  (ii)  smuggling,  (iii)  trafficking  in  human 
beings; (iv) radicalisation; (v) cybercrime; (vi) drugs; (vii) chemical, biological, radiological and 
nuclear  explosives;  (viii) forensics;  and  (ix)  economic  and  financial  crime.  While  the  union 
actions’  scope  as  well as  the number  of participants involved is relatively limited compared to 
actions under the national programmes, the projects incorporating a train-the-trainer approach57 
have the potential for a multiplier effect in training a large number of law enforcement staff  in 
the second half of the Fund’s implementation. 

Compared to the ISEC and CIPS programmes, ISF-P’s progress in this area has been limited so 
far.  As  presented  under  the  section  on  coherence,  CEPOL  should  have  a  more  prominent  role 
when it comes to law enforcement training funded through ISF-P. 

5.2  How efficient has ISF-P been so far? 

This question aims to consider the relation between the inputs of the Fund (i.e. resources, budget, 
etc.) and the outputs it achieved. It tries to answer two questions: (i) to what extent the effects of 
the  actions  were  achieved  at  a  reasonable  cost  in  terms  of  financial  and  human  resources 
deployed  and  (ii)  what  measures  were  put  into  place  to  prevent,  detect,  report  and  follow-up 
cases of fraud, and other irregularities. 

In a nutshell 

57   By  design,  the  union  actions  focus  on  the  train-the-trainer  approach  and  hence  are  limited  in  the  number  of 
people they directly train. Indirectly, the union actions could lead to a number of people being trained across the 
EU. 

37 

 
                                                 
Overall, in the limits of available data, it could be considered that the results of the Fund have 
been achieved at reasonable cost in terms of both human and financial resources. Some Member 
States  have  put  in  place  national  efficiency  measures.  However,  most  Member  States  face 
problems  with  the  EU  guidance,  common  indicators  and  the  reporting/monitoring  calendar. 
Despite simplification improvements, the perceived administrative burden can be considered as a 
factor that undermines efficiency. 

Overall,  the  available  data  suggests  that  the  Fund’s  results  have  been  achieved  so  far  at 
reasonable costs in terms of both financial and human resources58 as far as it is possible to assess 
at  this  stage.  The  perceived  administrative  burden  can  be  considered  as  being  the  main  factor 
undermining efficiency. 

Low  levels  of  human  resources  costs  were  associated  with  implementing  the  national 
programmes (at responsible authority or delegated authority level). In terms of number of full-
time  equivalents  (FTEs)  in  the  responsible  authority,  delegated  authority  and  audit  authority 
compared  to  the  number  of  projects  implemented,  the  large  variation  found  suggests  that  the 
number of required full-time equivalents depends on the scope and volume of the projects that 
Member States need to implement at a particular moment. 

A total of 217 annual full time equivalent staff in Member States have been deployed to work on 
implementing the ISF, which corresponds to an average of 5.4 completed or ongoing projects per 
full  time  equivalent.  The  available  data  is  for  the  combined  ISF-BV  and  ISF-P,  therefore  the 
number of full-time equivalents linked to ISF-P is less than half of the total. The ratio of projects 
to full-time equivalents ranges from very high to very low. This may be due to the mere volume 
of  ISF  allocations,  with  some  Member  States  receiving  relatively  smaller  allocations  (e.g.  CZ, 
MT, LT and SK. It could also reflect the choices made by Member States when designing their 
programmes.  Some  Member  States  have  decided  to  concentrate  a  significant  amount  on  a  few 
bigger  projects,  which  only  cover  some  operational  objectives,  while  others  have  numerous 
smaller projects spread across all operational objectives. On average, 7.08 full-time equivalents 
per  Member  State  have  been  involved  in  managing  the  Fund  and  are  paid  through  technical 
assistance59  or  national  budgets,  with  remarkable  differences  between  the  different  Member 
States.  Overall,  taking  into  account  the  average  number  of  projects  implemented  by  2017 
(12.84), an average of 0.55 full-time equivalents were engaged per project. Member States show 
a growing or stable number of full-time equivalents over the years from 2014 to 201760. 

Some of the success factors that brought efficiency have been the following:  

  public agencies that benefit from the Fund were able to use their own networks to involve 

additional resources on an ad hoc basis and at no extra cost for the project;  

  considerable knowledge and expertise had been gained through experience from previous 
projects (especially  from  the  CIPS/ISEC  programmes  and  from  other  programmes  with 
multiannual projects); 

58   As also confirmed by 17 Member States (AT, BG, CZ, DE, ES, FR, HU, LU, MT, NL, PL, EL, HR, IS, SE, SI 
and SK); 10 participants to the eighth Evaluation Network Meeting (BE, BG, FI, HR, HU, NL, PL, PT and RO). 
59   Technical  assistance  should  enable  the  Member  States  to  carry  out  the  implementation  of  their  national 

programmes and assist beneficiaries in complying with their obligations and EU law. 

60   Except Germany (where full-time equivalents decreased from 25 to 21) and Malta (where full-time equivalents  

decreased from 13 to 10). 

38 

 
                                                 
  staff were already employed in the organisation; and 

 

the flexibility of the national programmes.  

Furthermore,  national  measures  concerning  the  application,  implementation,  monitoring  and 
reporting  process  have  been  put  in  place  in  some  Member  States61  to  ensure  efficiency  which 
include  some  of  the  following  actions:  (i) administrative  and  technical  project  approval 
procedures, (ii) procedures to assess whether expenditure is appropriate, (iii) project monitoring 
mechanisms,  and  (iv)  national  coordination  mechanisms.  There  are  also  a  number  of  issues  at 
Member  State  level  that  are  deemed  to  negatively  affect  efficiency.  These  are:  (i)  the 
requirement  to  allocate  minimum  percentages  to  national  objectives62,  which  are  complex  and 
recurrent in reports63, (ii) common indicators64 and (iii) the alignment of monitoring calendars65. 

Measures put in place to prevent, detect, report and follow-up cases of suspected fraud and other 
irregularities have also been contributing to a cost-effective implementation, through: 

  prevention:  careful  examination  of  project  applications;  ex  ante  public  procurement 
control  systems;  risk  analysis  by  the  responsible  authority/delegated  authority;  training 
on fraud prevention or fraud risk management; provision of guidance tools; and regular 
communication between projects and responsible authority staff; 

  detection: administrative control checks; operational on-the-spot checks; financial on-the-

spot checks; and ex post audits; 

 

reporting and follow-up: implementation of communication instruments; establishment of 
procedures for reporting suspected fraud; and establishment of procedures for corrective 
and deterrent measures. 

The majority of Member States claim that the management and control measures are appropriate 
and effective, saying that stringent mechanisms ensure that fraud and irregularities are prevented. 
However, experience suggests that there is always a potential trade-off between the procedures 
in  place  to  prevent  fraud  and  irregularities  and  the  Fund’s  overall  efficiency,  in  the  sense  that 
measures  can  be  seen  as  very  effective  for  preventing  fraud,  but  they  are  not  necessarily  very 
efficient from a management perspective. 

DG  HOME’s  human  resources  have  only  slightly  increased,  despite  the  large  increase  in  the 
value  of  the  emergency  assistance  and  the  emergency  situation  on  the  ground  following  the 
migration crisis, and the need to follow-up closely and assist those Member States under pressure 
while implementing their respective national programmes, which have put an enormous strain on 
the Commission’s general directorates and services. Overall, the emergency assistance and union 
actions as well as the objectives concerning indirect management actions have been achieved at a 
reasonable cost in terms of financial and human resources used in DG HOME. 

61   Seven  national  interim  evaluation  reports  (AT,  BE,  FR,  HU,  MT,  PL  and  SE).  Interviews  with  several 

responsible authorities (BG, EL, FI, LT, PL and PT). 

62   Two  national  interim  evaluation  reports  (BE  and  SI).  Several  responsible  authorities  participating  in  the  eight 

evaluation network meeting (BE, EE, ES, HU, LT, NL and PL). 

63   Eight national interim evaluation reports (AT, BE, CY, CZ, ES, FR, IT and LV); four participants in the eighth 

evaluation network meeting (BE, BG, DE and IT). 

64   Several participants in the eight evaluation network meeting (BE, DE, CZ, FI, FR, HU, LU, MT, PL and PT); 

one national interim evaluation report (DE). 

65   Two  participants  in  the  eighth  evaluation  network  meeting  (BE  and  FR).  Three  national  interim  evaluation 

reports (BE, CY and FI). Interviews with two responsible authorities (FR and BE). 

39 

 
                                                 
5.3  How  much  simplification  and  reduction  of  administrative  burden  has 

ISF-P brought so far? 

This  question aims to  analyse  the innovative procedures that the Fund introduced and looks at 
the extent to which they have simplified management procedures and reduced the administrative 
burden  for  the  Fund’s  beneficiaries.  Nonetheless,  it  is  difficult  to  quantify  how  much 
simplification  was  brought  by  the  ISF-P  overall,  therefore  a  qualitative  assessment  has  been 
made instead. 

In a nutshell 

The  single  set  of  procedures  for  all  areas  covered  by  the  Fund  and  for  both  AMIF  and  ISF  in 
general was found to have led to simplification. The simplified cost option was used in only a 
few  Member  States  who  acknowledged  its  efficiency  in  reducing  the  administrative  burden. 
However,  the  measures  that  the  Fund  implemented  for  simplifying  and  reducing  the 
administrative burden have only partially achieved their intended goals. In spite of simplification 
improvements,  there  is  little  evidence  at  this  stage  that  the  administrative  burden  has  been 
significantly reduced. Monitoring, reporting and verification measures are still burdensome and 
Member States have asked for further guidance in order to comply with EU requirements. The 
reporting  requirements  and  the  irrelevance  of  some  common  indicators  were  also  reported  as 
adding to the administrative burden. 

Overall, the measures that ISF-P implemented to simplify and reduce administrative burden have 
only partially achieved their intended goals. The ISF-P introduced several new administrative 
and  managerial  procedures  such  as:  simplified  cost  option,  multiannual  programming,  national 
eligibility rules, more comprehensive national programmes, new IT-tools, and requirements for 
collecting cost data according to the Better Regulation guidelines and toolbox. 

Under shared management, varied opinions are given by the responsible authorities. Up to 11 
(half  of  the  consulted  responsible  authorities)  stated  that  the  administrative  burden  has  been 
reduced. However, eight claimed the opposite and only three stated that there had been a limited 
reduction  compared  to  previous  EU  programmes.  The  responsible  authorities  claimed  that  the 
shift  from  programming  national  actions  on  an  annual  basis  to  a  multiannual  basis  was 
particularly beneficial, in the sense that it provides Member States with the necessary flexibility 
to plan and adjust their national programmes’ implementation according to changing needs and 
capacities.  The  wide  variety  of  benefits  entailed  by  multiannual  programming  includes:  the 
possibility  of  having  projects  with  longer  life-cycles;  the  potential  for  higher  levels  of 
payments66; and the elimination of the need to prepare annual programmes. However, there are 
still some challenges such as setting targets for 7 years, reporting multiple times per project or 
coupling  with  the  co-financiers’  annual  commitment  capacity  since  most  work  with  annual 
budgets. Also, the single set of procedures for all areas covered by the Fund and for both AMIF 
and ISF was found to lead to simplification. 

Furthermore, national eligibility rules were deemed to provide more flexibility in managing the 
national  programmes67.  However,  some  responsible  authorities  highlighted  that  these  rules 
actually added to the administrative burden68 and led to problems for participants from more than 

66   Funds not used in a given year can be deployed in later years. 
67   About two-thirds of the responsible authorities interviewed perceived the introduction of national eligibility rules 

(13 responses) as positive. 

68   Mainly because of the investment to implement them at national level (BE, CY and LU). 

40 

 
                                                 
one  country69.  Also,  the  simplified  cost  option  was  not  used  by  most  responsible  authorities 
consulted70. A minority of responsible authorities acknowledge either its efficiency in reducing 
administrative burden or its potential to do so71. 

Concerning the undue administrative burden, the presence of some irrelevant indicators as well 
as  the  requirement  to  report  on  all  indicators  regardless  of  the  actions  implemented  under  the 
national programmes  was highlighted72. Also, there are too many bodies in charge of financial 
controls over the use of EU funding compared to national funding and this creates a burden when 
implementing  projects  and  reporting  at  national  level  (CZ  and  NL),  the  timing  of  which  also 
differs from the one required under ISF-P. 

The  available  data  is  hard  to  interpret  and  does  not  provide  sufficient  detail  for  analysing  the 
simplification  and  reduction  of  administrative  burden  under  direct  management.  Overall, 
beneficiaries of union actions did not express any concern about the administrative burden and 
were content with the support they received at EU level. The study did not cover recipients of 
direct awards and procurement contracts. 

The  ISEC/CIPS  ex  post  evaluations  concluded  that  there  is  the  need  for  simplification  under 
direct management as the shared management mode was introduced for the first time under ISF-
P. Various improvements have been recommended such as: (i) better timing regarding calls for 
proposals,  (ii) making  the  budget  review  exercise  more  efficient,  (iii) discontinuing  the  use  of 
operating  grants,  (iv)  implementing  a  project  monitoring  system,  (v) strengthening  the 
framework partnership concept and (vi) increasing efforts to use flat-rates, lump sums etc. 

5.4  How relevant has ISF-P been so far? 

This question aims to determine whether the Fund’s original objectives are still relevant and how 
well  they  still  match  the  current  needs  and  problems.  It  also  addresses  the  programme’s 
flexibility against changing circumstances in the wider context. 

In a nutshell 

The Fund’s original rationale and objectives are still relevant in the aftermath of the migratory 
and  security  crisis.  Appropriate  mechanisms  to  address  the  changing  needs  have  been  put  in 
place both at the programming and implementation stages. The flexibility offered by the Fund, 
consisting  of  transfers  of  money  between  different  objectives,  helped  to  address  the  changing 
needs.  However  Member  States  would  appreciate  even  more  flexibility  that  would  result  from 
the  minimum  allocations  of  funds  to  objectives  no  longer  being  imposed  and  the  number  of 
national objectives being reduced. 

Alignment of national and ISF-P objectives 

69   Several Member States have chosen not to apply national eligibility rules: BE, BG, EE, ES, HU and SE. 
70   About two-thirds of the responsible authorities who responded (13 responses) stated that they are not using this 
option in the management of ISF-P. The other third (6 responses out of 20 responses) believed that the simplified 
cost option does reduce administrative burden. 

71   Some  responsible  authorities  that  are  not  using  the  option,  see  its  potential  or  believe  it  needs  to  be  further 

elaborated (CZ), and others plan to introduce it in 2018 (ES). 

72   Some indicators are not relevant for the impact they are supposed to measure (e.g. number of seizures of drugs is 

not considered a relevant indicator, as it ignores the amounts seized): DE, PT and NL. 

41 

 
                                                 
The  alignment  of  national  and  ISF-P’s  objectives  already  started  during  the  policy  dialogues 
between  the  Commission  and  Member  States.  At  that  level,  both  parties  identified  the  links 
between  ISF-P  objectives  and  those  of  national  strategic  documents  (such  as  national  internal 
security  strategies,  or  cybersecurity,  organised  crime,  or  counter-terrorism  and  radicalisation 
strategies). In addition, the policy dialogues mapped the ‘key issues’, which in effect represented 
the key internal security threats and risks and related needs. The capacity and capability needs 
that were identified reflected both crime-area specific needs as well as cross-cutting needs. 

In their national programmes, the Member States identified the relevant policy areas as included 
in  the  European  multidisciplinary  platform  against  criminal  threats  policy  cycle73.  However, 
some also choose to focus on an area that presents challenges for them, such as drugs, trafficking 
in  human  beings,  cybercrime,  financial  crime  or  corruption.  The  scope  and  objectives  of  the 
national programmes were sufficiently broad and flexible to accommodate changing needs and 
there was no need for significant changes. Overall, the identified threats fall within the scope of 
the existing objectives and actions as defined in the national programmes. However, the recent 
context of the unprecedented migration crisis and rise of terrorism and the substantial differences 
in the security situation between some member states highlighted the need for higher flexibility 
in  designing  the  national  programmes  so  they  can  respond  to  changing  needs.  A  number  of 
Member  States74  agreed  that  flexibility  in  designing  national  programmes  is  important  as  the 
security  situation  is  prone  to  rapid  change  and  may  also  differ  quite  substantially  from  one 
Member State to another. 

According to the Article 5 of ISF-P’s legal base, Member States have to reserve a minimum of 
20 % of their budget for the first specific objective ‘crime prevention’ and a minimum of 10 % 
for  the  second  specific  objective  ‘risks  and  crisis’.  This  provision  is  in  place  to  ensure  that 
Member States tackle both objectives. In practice, 73 % of ISF-P funds were allocated for ‘crime 
prevention’ and 27 % were allocated for ‘risks and crisis’ in the national programmes. 

Although  flexibility  is  allowed  when  using  the  Fund,  Member  States  reported  that  when 
designing the national programmes they have felt the need to focus on most of the priorities and 
thus,  they did not  focus their programmes  on a few operational objectives  but rather tended to 
spread  the  funding  across  most  priorities.  Thus,  more  flexibility  should  be  given  to  Member 
States so they can focus on specific individual objectives and use resources in a limited number 
of objectives/thematic areas (thematic concentration) instead of pursuing various priorities across 
different  areas75.  Member  States  would  appreciate  more  guidance  or  discussion  around 
concentration vs the spreading of funding across priorities. They believe that spreading funding 
across  too  many  priorities  results  in  fragmentation  of  the  funds  which  may  limit  the  overall 
effect. 

The  majority  of  projects  are  in  the  area  of  crime  policy.  The  objective  of  strengthening 
cooperation and coordination was identified in the national programmes of many Member States 
and thus most of the projects concerned either purchasing IT equipment or purchasing equipment 
for law enforcement authorities. 

73   Facilitation  of  illegal  immigration;  trafficking  in  human  beings;  counterfeit  goods;  excise  and  missing  trader 
intra-community  (MTIC)  fraud;  cocaine  and  heroin;  synthetic  drugs;  illicit  firearms  trafficking;  organised 
property  crime;  and  cybercrime.  More 
found  on  Europol’s  website  here: 
https://www.europol.europa.eu/crime-areas-and-trends/eu-policy-cycle-empact 

information  may  be 

74   BE, BG, DE, ES, HU, MT, PL, RO and SK. 
75   Opinions expressed by AT, CZ, FI and HU. 

42 

 
                                                 
Some Member States did not receive project proposals in relation to some of the objectives (FR, 
FI  and  HU76).  This  fact  does  not  necessarily  indicate  that  the  objectives  were  not  relevant. 
Possible explanations include the potential beneficiaries’ lack of experience with writing project 
proposals and timing issues. In some other cases relevant projects were selected, but contextual 
changes affected the relevance later on77. 

Alignment of union actions and emergency assistance and actual needs 

The  union  actions  aimed  to  focus  on  areas  of  particular  interest  for  the  EU  that  were 
complementary  to  shared  management.  Most  of  the  union  actions  were  based  on  a  needs 
assessment78.  Stakeholders  also  believed  that  the  Fund’s  objectives  and  expected  results 
corresponded  well  to  the  EU’s  needs  and  strategic  priorities,  needs  of  EU  organisations  and 
needs of the Member States where the organisation is based. The annual work programmes were 
aligned  with  the  EU  internal  security  strategy.  The  objectives  of  the  2014-2016  annual  work 
programmes  in  providing  support  to  union  actions  and  emergency  assistance  under  ISF-P 
correspond to the EU internal security strategy’s objectives and threat assessments. For example, 
open calls on chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear explosives, radicalisation, trafficking 
in human beings, economic and financial crime correspond to the strategy’s priority areas. 

Therefore, the objectives set in the annual work programme addressed the actual needs well, in 
particular the needs for actions with a transnational dimension. The calls for proposals sought 
to fund projects addressing different parts of the above-mentioned themes. However, given the 
small  amount  of  funding  and  the  number  of  projects  awarded  through  open  calls,  only  a  few 
organisations will receive funding for projects in the end. In addition, open calls seem to target 
areas of high priority and are specific or targeted to a particular topic within a sub-area79. Thus 
these targeted calls contribute to the Fund’s relevance. Such focus when linked and aligned with 
current wider priorities and also the activities of other EU bodies, such as Europol, is welcome in 
order to maximise the results of the actions. 

The  calls  for  proposals  are  considered  relevant  and  appropriate  by  the  Member  States  as  they 
have a strong transnational dimension and were informed by the current needs. The rationale for 
selecting  the  particular  calls  was  clearly  outlined  in  the  annual  work  programmes.  However, 
some  Member  States  would  welcome  a  clearer  definition  and  presentation  of  the  rationale  for 
selecting  priorities  and  calls  for  proposals.  Also,  implementation  challenges  and  the  need  for 
assistance in project coordination were mentioned as obstacles to participating in union actions 
(BE  and  HU).  Key  players,  such  as  Europol,  should  be  closely  consulted  when  defining  such 
open calls. 

Similarly  to  the  preceding  ISEC  and  CIPS  programmes,  there  is  continuing  geographical 
imbalance when it comes to awarded actions under open calls for proposals. This is due to the 
specific nature of the open calls, whereby applicants choose to apply to calls depending on their 

76   For example, the Hungarian responsible authority published a call for proposals on research activities related to 

industrial infrastructure but no project proposals were received. 

77   For example, in Belgium an ongoing project had difficulties in fulfilling its objectives as it was dependent on an 
external partner whose internal priorities were affected by the terrorist attacks. On another project carried out in 
Belgium, changing circumstances (shift to outsourcing) reduced the need for a particular project (investment in 
own infrastructure), and as such, decreased that project’s relevance (BE-national interim evaluation report). 

78   Survey with project coordinators – 75% ‘yes’ or 26 respondents. 
79   For example, the call ISFP-2017-AG-THBX on trafficking in human beings is focused on two priorities: Priority 
1  -  Profile/modus  operandi  of  traffickers/criminal  organized  groups/links  with  other  forms  of  serious  and 
organized crimes, prosecutions and convictions; and Priority 2 - Actions focusing on the wider trafficking chain, 
including the profits involved in human trafficking. 

43 

 
                                                 
need or interest. However, due to the small number of union actions, even geographical spread 
would not be the main priority and is difficult to achieve in practice. Thus, the main focus of the 
open calls is to fund projects of EU significance that could boost a specific priority or identified 
need. 

With regard to the awarded projects, Belgium and Italy80 were the most active Member States in 
terms  of  the  number  of  grants  coordinated  and  also  by  the  total  amount  of  funding  awarded. 
Seven Member States which participate in ISF-P did not coordinate any grants under the calls for 
proposals (BG, EE, FI, HR, LV, MT and SK). Similar to the situation with ISEC and CIPS, this 
resulted in a geographical imbalance across the EU in terms of participation in ISF-P. 

The  thematic  calls  were  overall  balanced  in  terms  of  the  number  of  projects  awarded,  with 
economic  and  financial  crime  and  chemical,  biological,  radiological  and  nuclear  explosives  
having the highest number of awarded projects. 

Projects  considered  to  be  particularly  relevant  by  consulted  national  stakeholders  were  those 
targeting:  (i)  radicalisation  and  propaganda;  (ii)  prisoners’  rehabilitation;  (iii)  the  return  of 
foreign  fighters;  (iv)  the  updating  of  police  infrastructure;  and  (v)  training  to  police  staff. 
However, more funding should be given for actions targeting anti-corruption initiatives as well 
as research (BE and CS). Likewise, in the area of cybersecurity, the Fund offered limited options 
for acquiring technical equipment. 

Also  considered  as  very  useful  were  actions  promoting  (i) networking,  (ii)  partnerships  and 
exchanges,  (iii)  police  cooperation  and  coordination,  (iv)  networking  and  training  with  third 
countries and (v) development and transfer of technology and methodology81. Collaboration with 
partners from other countries was considered particularly valuable as an experience but also with 
regard to the projects’ outputs. It is notable that compared to ISEC and CIPS, such collaboration 
has been reduced due to the much more limited number of open calls for proposals. However, 
the  networks  of  practitioners  supported  through  the  Fund  ensure  a  level  of  transnational 
collaboration. 

In  order  to  respond  to  crises,  a  flexible  emergency  response  mechanism  managed  by  the 
Commission  responds  to  relevant  and  immediate  needs  of  Member  States  and  is  meant  to 
quickly address threats with a significant impact on EU citizens’ security (see Section 3.2.2 on 
the  implementation  status  of  emergency  assistance).  However,  the  practical  implementation  of 
the emergency assistance actions highlighted certain limitations, mostly relating to the speed at 
which  this  funding  was  released  (usually  more  than  6  months).  Also,  as  the  term  ‘emergency 
situation’  is  quite  broad  and  offers  room  for  interpretation82,  it  offers  the  possibility  to  still 
continue  the  actions  even  if  the  situation  no  longer  represents  an  emergency  but  still  requires 
constant post-emergency assistance. 

Measures put in place to address changing needs 

Various mechanisms are in place to ensure that the national programmes respond to the changing 
needs  while  they  are  being  implemented.  Some  Member  States  have  continuous  consultations 

80  Belgium  with  11  projects  amounting  for  EUR  7  652  260  and  Italy  with  12  projects  amounting  for  EUR 

6 818 698). 

81   Information from case studies: DE, CS and CY. 
82   Art. 2, Regulation 513/2014 ‘emergency situation’ means any security-related incident or newly emerging threat, 
which has or may have a significant adverse impact on the security of people in one or more Member States. It 
does not specify the types of situation that Member States could treat as emergencies. 

44 

 
                                                 
with  potential  beneficiaries,  others  use  interim  consultative  processes.  Certain  Member  States 
had to adapt their national programmes to respond to the changing security environment and be 
able  to  focus  on  newly  emerging  needs83.  At  the  same  time,  the  objectives  of  the  national 
programmes  in  a  number  of  Member  States  (AT,  BE,  BG,  DE,  EE,  ES,  HU,  PT,  SE  and  SK) 
were sufficiently broad and flexible to accommodate changing needs and there was no need for 
significant changes. Overall, the identified threats fall within the scope of the existing objectives 
and actions as defined in the national programmes. In some Member States the changes relating 
to  the  security  situation  and  in  particular  to  terrorism  required  amendments  to  the  national 
programmes84.  Two  such  changes  which  led  to  revisions  in  the  national  programmes  resulted 
from  (i)  the  elevated  terrorism  threat  and  (ii) the  migration  crisis  and  security-related 
challenges85.  Also,  changes  to  the  national  programmes  may  have  resulted  from  the  need  to 
implement various EU legislative instruments86. 

In conclusion, the ISF-P objectives are still relevant to the needs of the Member States as also 
shown  by  the  requests  for  extra  funding.  Some  Member  States  expressed  that  they  needed  to 
extend measures already planned in their national programmes or provide additional funding87. 
In some cases the required changes involved a decrease in funding88 or its redistribution. In some 
other  cases  the  focus  of  law  enforcement  priorities  has  shifted,  while  in  others  this  focus  has 
expanded. 

5.5  How coherent and complementary has ISF-P been so far? 

These questions look at the extent to which different ISF-P actions work together internally and 
with  other  EU  interventions  and  to  identify  whether  there  are  complementarities,  gaps  and 
overlaps between different initiatives. 

In a nutshell 

The  Fund  is  considered  to  be  coherent  and  its  objectives  are  complementary  to  other  national 
policies.  The  Fund’s  coherence  and  its  complementarity  with  other  EU  financing  instruments 
have  been  ensured  during  the  design,  programming  and  implementation  stages.  Coordinating 
mechanisms  have  been  put  in  place  to  ensure  coherence  and  complementarity  at  the 
implementation stage. The monitoring committee and the responsible authority play key roles in 

83   For  instance,  France  refocused  its  strategy  on  the  fight  against  terrorism  in  light  of  the  terrorist  attacks  that 
targeted Paris in 2015. In Greece the specific objective ‘Preventing and Combating Crime’ had to be modified to 
add a new objective ‘Operating Support for First Practitioners’. 

84   For example in Greece, the specific objective ‘Preventing and Combating Crime’ had to be modified to add a 

new objective ‘Operating Support for First Practitioners’. 

85   Due to the elevated terrorism threat in Europe, more funding was required to prevent terrorism. However, some 
law  enforcement  organisations  were  less  interested  in  ISF-P  funding  via  EU  funds.  This  was  because  the 
objectives and eligible actions were not in line with their country’s needs. In addition, the rapid and widespread 
increase in the number of asylum seekers and migrants in 2015 led Member States to strengthen their focus on 
human trafficking victims or on establishing anti-radicalisation and mental health actions directed towards this 
group. 

86   For example, in Slovenia as a result of new regulations requiring Member States to set up national systems for 
the processing and recovery of information on airline passengers (due to the passenger name record directive), 
two new measures were added to the national programme. Similarly, the national programmes of a number of 
countries (BG, CY, EE, LV, LU, ES, SE and FI) were revised in relation to the passenger name record directive. 
87   For  instance,  Belgium  requested  an  additional  EUR 26 336  900  to  continue  funding  its  programme  on  de-

radicalisation. However, no changes to its national programme were envisaged. 

88   This is the case for Germany and Slovakia. Also in Belgium, the objectives of one project were reviewed due to 

higher than expected costs for equipment purchases. 

45 

 
                                                 
ensuring  coherence.  Different  implementation  modes  have  been  complementary  to  each  other. 
However,  there  appears  to  be  some  room  for  improvement  in  relation  to  EU  agencies  and  to 
internal coherence as there is little awareness among beneficiaries about the actions and projects 
carried out within the ISF framework. 

The  coherence  and  complementarity  of  actions  funded  under  the  national  programmes  was 
ensured by their design which was done according to the Member States needs assessment and 
the Fund’s rules. This ensured that the national programmes were consistent with other existing 
mechanisms that target the same needs as ISF-P89. Member States that did not carry out such an 
assessment  provided  reasons  as  to  why  this  was  not  considered  necessary.  In  particular,  some 
Member States (EE, RO and SI) claimed that the actions co-financed by ISF-P are very specific 
and  they  are  not  covered  by  other  national  programmes90.  For  example,  one  Member  State 
highlighted that although some areas covered by ISF-P (i.e. terrorism prevention, weapons and 
drug  smuggling,  corruption  and  de-radicalisation)  were  also  addressed  by  nationally  funded 
programmes,  the  type  of  projects  implemented  through  ISF-P  were  different (e.g.  international 
networks), which thus made them complementary to nationally funded actions.  

In addition, at national level, the vast majority of Member States ensured that ISF-P actions were 
coherent and complementary with similar interventions carried out under other EU funds through 
the establishment of coordination mechanisms91, mainly by setting up Monitoring Committees92 
involving different responsible authorities. The potential for their duplication with other actions 
funded  under  other  EU  programmes  was  limited  and  actively  managed,  especially  during  the 
programming  stage  (e.g.  through  inter-service  consultations,  working  groups  incorporating 
representatives  of  relevant  Commission  general  directorates  and  other  EU  institutions93  and 
through using informal communication channels between the relevant ministries94).  

The actions eligible under the national programmes were complementary in the sense that their 
actions  and  results  were  mutually  reinforcing95.  The  complementarity  of  actions  carried  out 
under the following policy areas was often mentioned: radicalisation, interoperability of systems, 
critical  infrastructures,  forensics  and  chemical,  biological,  radiological  and  nuclear  explosives 
preparedness.  Certain  types  of  actions  were  complementary  by  nature,  i.e.  the  acquisition  of 

89   Source national interim evaluation reports of BE, BG, CY, CZ, EL, FR, HU, IE, LT, LU, LV, MT, NL, PL and 
SK.  The  assessments  involved,  among other  things,  analysing similar  interventions under  previous  EU-funded 
programmes or the national programmes and policies (BE, CZ, HU, IE, LT and PL) or the participation of other 
relevant national and local authorities or beneficiaries of the projects (BG, CY, DE, MT and PL). 

90   National interim evaluation reports. 
91   At EU level, coordination mechanisms were used to prevent work from being duplicated and ensure synergies 
resulted  from  coordination  of  management  efforts.  In  particular,  during  the  Fund’s  programming  and 
implementation stages, specific actions were taken to ensure complementarity/synergies with: (i) ISF - Borders 
and  Visa;  (ii) AMIF,  (iii) Horizon  2020  –  applied  research  for  ISF-P;  (iv) ESIF  programmes  that  involve 
security;  (v)  EU  Solidarity  Fund;  (vi)  Instrument  for  pre-accession  assistance;  (vii)  external  aid;  (viii)  OLAF 
(Hercule programme); (ix) Norwegian/Swiss Cooperation funds; and (x) national funding and programmes. 
92   Monitoring Committees were established to ensure the operational coordination of the different funding sources. 
These groups allow project managers to provide an overview of the status of their projects, discuss bottlenecks 
and  detect  possibilities  for  cooperation  with  other  ISF-P  projects  (e.g.,  in  Estonia  this  mechanism  has 
occasionally led to adjustments to projects in order to eliminate overlapping and increase the potential impact of 
the  programme).  In  some  cases,  specific  coordination  mechanisms  were  implemented  for  large-scale  projects 
(e.g. the German Police Information and Analysis Network). 

93   This was evidenced by BE, BG, CY, DE, HU, LU, LV, NL, PL, SE, SI and SK. 
94   This was evidenced by CZ, EE, FR, HU, IE, IT, LT and SE. 
95   Nearly  all national  interim  evaluation  reports  established  the  complementarity  of  different  projects  carried out 
under  the  national  programmes.  Some  actions  were  intertwined  and  thus  are  mutually  contributing  to  the 
attainment of ISF-P objectives. 

46 

 
                                                 
equipment and software and training on their use. The level of complementarity also depends on 
the way in which actions are programmed under the national programmes. 

With regard to radicalisation, the RAN Centre of Excellence provides coordination and support 
for  the  Radicalisation  Awareness  Network  (RAN)96.  It  uses  its  expertise  to  guide  the  working 
groups,  offer  tailor-made  support  to  individual  countries  and  disseminate  knowledge  and 
practices.  The  EU  Internet  Forum  established  in  2015  brings  together  governments,  Europol, 
internet companies, the Counter-Terrorism Coordinator, the European Strategic Communications 
Network and the Radicalisation Awareness Network with the objective to reduce accessibility to 
terrorist  content  online  and  to  empower  the  civil  society  partners  to  increase  the  volume  of 
effective alternative narratives online. 

In  addition,  the  coherence  and  complementarity  at  project  level  can  be  ensured  through 
procurement  by  asking  the  applicants  to  explain  how  their  projects  were  going  to  create 
synergies,  as  well  as  to  declare  any  other  sources  of  funding97.  Their  applications  were  then 
examined  by  evaluation  committees  whose  members  are  usually  familiar  with  other  relevant 
programmes and can thus identify potential risks for overlapping. 

In the Member States where no assessment was carried out, the complementarity resulted from 
the  way  the  Fund’s  implementation  was  governed.  More  precisely,  the  wide  stakeholder 
consultation  during  the  programming  stage  allowed  for  the  high  consistency  of  priorities  and 
projects, thus ensuring the absence of conflicts. 

The  complementarity  among  the  Fund’s  different  implementation  modes  (shared,  direct  and 
indirect)  has  been  ensured.  Moreover,  no  overlapping  or  duplication  was  found  between  them, 
since  they  actually  covered  different  types  of  actions98.  Specifically,  direct  and  indirect 
management  were  generally  intended  to  be  designed  and  implemented  to  improve  and 
complement interventions planned under the national programmes, or to fund interventions that 
cannot  be  implemented  under  shared  management  for  several  reasons  (e.g.  allocation  limits, 
difficulties in reviewing the national programmes, etc.). In particular, the emergency assistance 
enabled  actions  that  are  difficult  to  be  implemented  under  the  national  programmes  (due  to 
allocation limits) to be supported, since they address emerging and unpredictable needs arising 
from  emergency  situations.  The  emergency  assistance  has  also  improved  private-public 
synergies99. The union actions allowed the Member States to plan and implement cross-country 
projects,  which  were  otherwise  not  affordable  under  the  national  programmes100.  Moreover, 
indirect management projects allowed the EU to entrust budget implementation tasks to partner 
countries,  bodies  designated  by  partner  countries,  or  international  organisations  with  the 
necessary expertise and knowledge to properly manage and implement the measures required. 

However, as regards internal coherence there appears to be some room for improvement, since it 
seems that ISF-P beneficiaries are not very aware of the actions and projects carried out within 
the ISF framework (beneficiaries appear to perceive most coordination as informal, to be done 

96   The RAN Collection of Approaches and Practices, which has been regularly updated since 2014, contains details 
of  radicalisation  projects  based  in  the  EU  which  are  transferable  to  other  contexts.  The  projects  have  been 
presented in a RAN Working Group meeting for peer review and approved by the RAN Steering Committee. 
97   For  example,  Estonia’s  national  interim  evaluation  report  states  that  applicants  are  obliged  to  provide  an 
overview of the projects that they have previously implemented as well as to state whether they plan to apply for 
other funds. 

98   Interviews  with  DG  Home  officials,  BG  Chief  Directorate  Police,  IT  Navy  and  CIES  Onlus  (beneficiary  of 

Italian emergency assistance), EL delegated authority. 

99   Ibidem. 
100  Interview with DG HOME officials. 

47 

 
                                                 
on  own  initiative  and  not  incentivised,  while  there  is  a  clear  need  for  more  formalised 
information at project and national level101). In some Member States, the responsible authorities 
were not aware about the projects that had been carried out in their country under union actions 
or  the  proposals  that  were  submitted  under  union  actions  calls  (ES,  HU  and  SE).  Respondents 
suggested  that  the  Commission  could  consider  providing  such  information  to  the  responsible 
authorities102.  Furthermore,  responses  to  the  targeted  consultation  suggested  that  cooperation 
between  project  coordinators  of  different  union  actions  does  not  seem  to  be  a  common 
practice103.  Hence,  no  cooperation  mechanism  to  ensure  coherence  between  the  actions 
implemented  under  the  national  programmes  and  the  union  actions  has  been  formally  set  up. 
Despite all this, project coordinators and co-beneficiaries of the union actions consider that their 
projects are coherent and are consistent with other interventions104 at national and EU level. 

It  is  possible  to  pursue  the  potential  complementarity  of  ISF-P  with  other  EU-funded 
programmes in the field of crime prevention as well as management of risks and crises. In the 
field  of  crime  prevention,  the  complementarity  between  ISF-P  and  the  following  EU 
programmes has been assessed: the justice programme; Hercule III; Horizon 2020 (H2020); and 
the rights, equality and citizenship programme. Two instruments focused on third countries are 
also included in the assessment of coherence: (i) the Instrument for pre-accession (IPA II) and 
the  European  Neighbourhood  Instrument.  The  legal  bases  of  these  programmes  point  to  the 
complementarity between these and ISF-P in terms of the objectives they pursue, their territorial 
and material scope, the actions that are eligible for funding and the groups they target. However, 
the risk of these programmes and ISF-P duplicating efforts is minimal due to the different nature 
of the actions or eligible activities that they cover. 

In the field of risk and crisis management, complementarity between ISF-P and the following EU 
programmes  has  been  assessed:  Horizon  2020:  the  EU  Civil  Protection  Mechanism;  the  health 
for growth programme and, from an external dimension, the Instrument contributing to stability 
and  peace  (IcSP).  As  in  the  field  of  crime  prevention,  an  analysis  of  the  legal  bases  of  these 
instruments points  to  a certain  overlap  between  ISF-P  and  some  of  these  programmes,  namely 
Horizon  2020  and  the  EU  Civil  Protection  Mechanism.  However,  the  actual  duplication  of 
efforts is prevented due to the different activities funded and the different coverage of the actions 
funded. 

Furthermore,  the  activities  of  the  relevant  EU  agencies  should  be  more  aligned  with  similar 
activities in ISF-P to avoid duplication and ensure synergies. Agencies should be consulted in the 
Fund’s  programming  and  implementation  stages  in  inter-service  consultations  and  at  project 
level, including in the formulation of the annual work programmes. Europol plays a key role in 
the area of law enforcement and is active in the same areas as ISF-P, in particular as a support 
centre  for  law  enforcement  operations.  One  example  that  highlighted  where  overlap  was 
observed was in the area of firearms trafficking. The high degree of potential duplication should 
be well managed and it should be ensured that different funding streams and budgets are aligned. 
Europol is also a key player when it comes to the interoperability of IT systems and it should be 

101  Except for two interviewees who proactively monitor the activities carried out at national level (ES-I-UA, NL-I-
UA), all project coordinators stated that they are not aware of the projects implemented in their field of expertise. 

102  Other Member States had a Monitoring Committee (BG) and were informed about union actions projects. 
103  Most respondents participating in the targeted consultation for project beneficiaries (67% or eight respondents) 
declared they have not established cooperation or synergies with other projects/actions funded by the EU or at 
national level. 

104  Almost all respondents of the targeted consultation for project coordinators (97% or 30 respondents) and all the  
respondents for co-beneficiaries (100% or 12 respondents) agreed with the question ‘Do you consider that the 
project was coherent and non-contradictory with other actions / projects?’. 

48 

 
                                                 
involved in such projects. Also, CEPOL is the EU agency for law enforcement training and its 
activities  pose  the  risk  of  duplication  with  some  actions  funded  under  ISF-P  in  the  area  of 
training. CEPOL should be more involved in implementing and monitoring projects in the area 
of  training  and,  given  its  central  overview  of  training  needs  and  its  technical  knowledge,  it 
should be consulted regarding the training funded through ISF-P.  

5.6  What is the EU added value of ISF-P so far? 

This question aims to assess the value that results from ISF-P that is additional to the value that 
could  result  from  interventions  which  would  have  been  achieved  by  the  Member  States  at 
national level. 

In a nutshell 

Overall, the Fund has ensured EU added value in terms of improving cross-border cooperation, 
exchanging  knowledge  and  best  practice,  trust  amongst  Member  States  law  enforcement 
authorities and applying and implementing key EU policies (process effects). It has also helped 
to  broaden  the  scope  and  improve  the  quality  of  the  actions  in  terms  of  investments  in  under-
prioritised or highly specialised areas. The purchase of state-of-the-art equipment has boosted the 
capabilities of the national authorities to carry out specialised interventions with a wider scope. 
The  Fund  has  also  enabled  the  broadening  of  the  types  of  knowledge  exchange  and  law 
enforcement  training  (scope  effects).  The  Fund  has  proved  that  it  contributed  to  harmonising 
EU-level research on crime prevention, as well as enabled increased investments and focused on 
long-term  measures  in  this  area.  It  has  also  enabled  high-volume  investments,  especially  in  IT 
systems,  training  and  specialised  equipment  (volume  effects).  The  absence  of  ISF-P  funding 
would have been detrimental to both the quality of the EU response to cross-border cooperation 
and the Member States ability to implement innovative solutions (role effects). 

The main EU added value of ISF-P can be found in its process, scope and volume effects, as well 
as in its role effects. As most security threats identified at EU level are cross-border and call for 
better cooperation between Member States, the main EU level benefit of ISF-P arises from the 
transnational dimension of certain actions, especially the Union actions which are seen as having 
a  stronger  emphasis  on  the  EU  dimensions  that  directly  relate  to  these  threats.  As  regards  the 
national  programmes,  the  Fund  is  seen  as  contributing  to  a  safer  Europe  through  boosting 
cooperation and working together with the Member States on their national priorities. 

Therefore,  the  Fund  has  ensured  EU  added  value  by  enabling  cross-border  projects  to  be 
implemented  through  encouraging  operational  cooperation  and  mutual  learning.  It  has  also 
helped to implement EU IT systems at national level. Moreover, ISF-P is seen as broadening the 
scope and volume of existing national interventions, which, under national funding programmes, 
would not have been implemented at the same scale or within the same timeframe, while some 
actions would not have been implemented at all without ISF-P. 

The  ISEC  and  CIPS  programmes  had  a  strong  transnational  dimension  as  transnational 
cooperation was a prerequisite for funding except in very special cases which had an EU priority. 
However,  the  geographical  distribution  of  coordinating  and  partner  organisations  that  received 
funding was highly uneven and concentrated in a few Members States. EU added value for ISEC 
and  CIPS  could  have  been  higher  if  organisations  had  been  better  spread  over  the  Member 
States. By establishing the shared management mode in ISF-P (initially 60 % of total programme 
and  over  70 %  after  the  top-ups),  ISF-P  had  a  better  geographical  reach  across  all  Member 

49 

 
 
States. However, Union actions, especially those implemented through open calls for proposals, 
are characterised again with the same geographical imbalance that was in ISEC and CIPS. 

One  of  the  main  components  strengthening  EU  added  value  in  ISEC  and  CIPS  was  the 
transnational  partnerships  established  as  part  of  the  projects.  In  the  vast  majority  of  cases, 
coordinating  and  partner  organisations  thought  that  cooperation  and  exchange  of  information 
with  organisations from other  countries helped them to  gain more knowledge  and expertise on 
the  subjects  they  were  working  on.  In  comparison,  ISF-P  introduced  a  new  operational  tool  to 
strengthen  Member  States’  capabilities,  which  enabled  improvements  in  technical  and 
operational  capabilities  at  national  level,  including  through  the  purchase  of  state-of-the-art 
equipment and, to a lesser extent, cooperation and exchange of information. However, the union 
actions,  especially  those  funded  under  open  calls  for  proposal,  continue  to  show  very  similar 
geographical patterns to ISEC and CIPS. 

Under shared management, in terms of scope effects, the scope of ISF-P was very broad to allow 
Member  States  the  flexibility  to  define  priorities  and  also  to  respond  to  a  changing  security 
environment (as established in Section 5.4). ISF-P has facilitated increased investments in crime 
prevention activities105 which often receive fewer funds from national authorities due to higher 
priority being given to investigation and prosecution of crimes106. This also includes a stronger 
focus  on  long-term  measures  in  the  field  of  crime  prevention,  which  would  not  have  been 
possible  otherwise  due  to  the  short-term  nature  of  national  political  priorities.  In  addition,  the 
purchase  of  state-of-the-art  equipment  has  strengthened  the  capabilities  of  national  specialised 
authorities to carry out interventions with a wider scope, e.g. the analysis of portable devices for 
cybercrime  investigations107.  It  has  also  enabled  the  broadening  of  the  types  of  knowledge 
exchange and law enforcement training. 

Regarding volume effects, ISF-P has added volume to existing national actions  in a number of 
ways.  The  Fund  had  brought  significant  EU  added  value  by  increasing  the  volume  of 
investments in under-prioritised policy areas, such as the fight against organised crime which has 
been  at  a  disadvantage  compared  to  terrorism  over  recent  years108.  It  has  also  enabled  system 
upgrades  and  updates  to  allow  for  more  comprehensive  coverage  of  data  exchange  among 
national  authorities,  increased  the  total  number  of  trained  staff,  and  strengthened  the  Member 
States’ capabilities through purchasing specialised equipment (RO, PT, PL and MT). 

Furthermore,  the  Fund  has  facilitated  and  enabled  synergies,  cooperation  and  the  exchange  of 
information and knowledge among Member States Joint Investigation Teams (CY, LV, BG and 
HU).  ISF-P  has  strengthened  measures  arising  from  EU  requirements,  including  through  a 
common  steering  methodology  (e.g.  support  for  standardising  information  exchange  through 
SIENA). 

ISF-P’s  process  effects  are  seen  as  increasing  the  quality  and  effectiveness  of  activities, 
processes  and  procedures  required  to  ensure  security  at  national  level  (HR,  LV  and  MT), 
including through upgrading IT systems and providing guidance on the design and management 
of projects relating to law enforcement. Also, ISF-P has contributed to the better use of common 

105  Projects on prevention of radicalisation, particularly of young people were carried out in: BE, DE, EE, FI, CY, 
PT and SE. For example, in Germany, the project ‘Online and offline intervention for de-radicalisation via social 
media’  aimed  to  prevent  or  reverse  radicalisation  processes  by  social  media  and  online  communication.  In 
Romania, training was organised aimed at preventing corruption in public administration. 

106  As per evaluation workshop with the responsible authorities, national interim evaluation reports. 
107  Ibidem. 
108  Through a research network on organised crime as per national interim evaluation reports. 

50 

 
                                                 
systems amongst Member States and a greater budgetary flexibility, wherein a leverage effect is 
achieved,  which  enables  Member  States  to  increase  the  number  and  broaden  the  scope  of 
projects (CY, LU and HU). 

In  terms  of  role  effects,  the  implementation  of  ISF-P  funded  actions  plays  a  major  role  in 
innovation,  new  ways  of  working,  and  new  cooperation.  The  Fund  acts  as  a  catalyst  for 
developing  police  approaches  to  fight  crime  (e.g.  new  or  extended  joint  trainings,  transfer  of 
methodologies, and networks among law enforcement agencies). ISF-P has generated significant 
EU  added  value  through  increased  investments  in  innovation  intended  for  law  enforcement 
authorities, as well as the implementation of new technologies and their mainstreaming to police 
forces (BE, EE, FR and IT). Also, the Fund has increased the number  of activities with  cross-
border  dimensions  and  strengthened  the  cooperation  among  Member  States  while  facilitating 
their leadership in particular areas (LU). 

Regarding  direct  management,  in  terms  of  scope  effects,  similarly  to  actions  funded  through 
ISEC and CIPS, Union actions also contribute to enabling EU regulatory transposition in a range 
of  fields,  such  as  anti-money  laundering  (CZ).  Activities  implemented  through  Union  actions 
also  covered  broader  initiatives  such  as  cross-border  cooperation  by  involving  countries  from 
wider geographical areas, as well as inter-regional cooperation by bringing together regions from 
across  the  whole  EU  (DE).  Furthermore,  some  projects  are  said  to  have  helped  increase  the 
quality of information exchange among Member States and with third countries (e.g. countries of 
the Western Balkans), which would fall outside of national funding priorities (DE). 

In terms of volume effects, a total of 60 projects were awarded through open calls for proposals 
for  the  Fund’s  first  implementation  period.  At  this  rate,  it  could  be  expected  that  around  150 
projects  will  be  awarded  through  ISF-P  open  calls.  In  comparison  to  this,  569  projects  were 
implemented through open calls for proposals in ISEC and CIPS for the entire period. This is an 
obvious decrease of the volume of actions implemented and thus, no increase in volume effects 
can be observed compared to ISF-P’s predecessor programmes. Regarding direct awards, ISF-P 
has continued to provide funding to EU networks of practitioners as had happened through ISEC 
and CIPS and thus, there is continuation rather than an increase in the volume. 

In terms of process effects, Union actions are helping to increase the quality and effectiveness of 
activities, processes and procedures required to ensure security. This has been done for example 
through developing common techniques, tools and methodologies. 

In  terms  of  role  effects,  some  of  the  greatest  achievements  of  the  Fund  were  boosting  cross-
border  cooperation,  encouraging  trust-building  amongst  Member  States  law  enforcement 
authorities and better application and implementation of key EU policies (such as implementing 
the passenger name record directive or the European multidisciplinary platform against criminal 
threats)  or  EU  IT  systems109.  This  included  bringing  people  together  through  training  and 
exchange  programmes110,  which  enabled  research  and  law  enforcement  organisations  to  work 
with partners from other Member States111. The Fund has also contributed to the harmonisation 
of  EU-level  research  on  forensics  and  crime  prevention,  as  well  as  to  the  involvement  of  civil 
society in crime prevention research and actions. In addition, ISF-P has contributed to the better 
exchange  of  knowledge  and  best  practices,  especially  through  its  support  of  directly  funded 
professional networks, such as ATLAS or CARIN. 

109  The  EU  dimension  is  the  most  visible  in  actions  implementing  EU  legislation  such  as  interoperability  of  IT 

systems. 

110  Аs per scoping interviews and as per discussions at an evaluation workshop with Responsible Authorities. 
111  As per interviews with coordinators of Union actions. 

51 

 
                                                 
The absence of ISF-P funding would have been detrimental to the quality of the EU response to 
cross-border  cooperation  and  to  the  ability  of  the  Member  States  to  implement  innovative 
solutions.  Nevertheless,  some  actions  would  have  been  implemented  only  as  a  minimum  to 
comply  with  EU  legislation  and  they  would  have  been  limited  in  scope  and  quality,  therefore 
diminishing  Member  States’  capacities  for  cross-border  crime  prevention,  detection  and 
investigation,  information  exchange  and  innovation112.  Similarly,  certain  actions  would  have 
been implemented mainly in specific areas of national interest (e.g. the passenger name record, 
EU  IT  systems),  while  others  would  have  risked  not  being  funded  at  all  or  suffered  delays113. 
With  respect  to  Union  actions,  ISF-P  largely  supported  projects,  especially  the  ones  linked  to 
civil society organisations that would not have taken place without its support. 

The  interruption  of  ISF-P  financing,  and  especially the  funding  to  the  national  programmes,  is 
likely to have significantly negative implications on the efforts already put in place as well as: (i) 
cause a reduction of the scope and quality (e.g. the number of target beneficiaries reached, the 
type  of  services  provided),  (ii)  delays  in  the  Fund’s  implementation  or  its  possible 
discontinuation, (iii) loss of networking capacity, (iv) less innovative measures, (v) a revision of 
priorities  and  (vi) the  risk  of  the  Member  States  not  reaching  EU/national  goals.  Also,  most 
union  actions  funded  by  ISF-P  would  not  have  taken  place  without  its  support.  Discontinuing 
support  for  union  actions  would  likely  result  in  the  loss  of  exchange  of  expertise  between  the 
partners and Member States participating in joint activities. 

5.7  How sustainable are the actions implemented under ISF-P so far? 

This evaluation question aims to look at (a) how long the effects of the actions are likely to last 
after the intervention ends (sustainability of effects), and (b) the extent to which the actions can 
be continued after the ISF-P financing ends (sustainability of actions). 

In a nutshell 

The  Fund’s  sustainability  has  been  ensured  through  the  alignment  and  complementarity  of  its 
actions  with  actions  developed  in  response  to  national  priorities  or  EU  requirements. 
Comprehensive  measures  and  mechanisms  ensuring  sustainability  have  been  put  in  place  at 
programming  and  implementation  stages  both  under  shared  and  direct  management.  However, 
the ongoing implementation of most projects makes it difficult to establish whether the effects on 
the target groups and on specific areas will really last. 

A  wide  range  of  measures  to  ensure  sustainability  of  project  results  are  in  place  for  projects 
implemented both under shared and direct management. Regarding the national programmes, at 
the  selection  stage  the  following  measures  ensuring  sustainability  are  envisaged:  (i) the 
evaluation of project sustainability114, ensuring maintenance and follow-up costs are accounted 
for (especially for IT equipment)115 and (ii) minimum requirements for warranty and duration of 
targeted or declared utilisation116. 

112  BE, BG, CY, CZ, ES, SK, RO, PT, MT, LV. LU, IT, HR and FI. 
113  ISF-P  has  funded  some  low  priority,  niche,  highly  specialised  and  innovative  projects,  which,  without  EU 
support, would have been temporarily or indefinitely halted (AT, BE, BG, CZ, EE, SK, RO, PT. IT and FI). 
114  For example, projects are evaluated for sustainability by the Policy Committee and the Programming Committee 
in  France  (FR).  Sustainability  checks  are  also  performed  by  some  responsible  authorities  at  the  programming 
stage (LV). 

115  In  some  Member  States  the  beneficiaries  are  required  to  specify  in  the  application  process  the  size  of  the 
operating,  follow-up  and  maintenance  costs  and  to  describe  how  they  will  be  covered  after  the  projects  are 

52 

 
                                                 
 
At the implementation stage, quantitative and qualitative indicators are defined and monitored in 
order to  ensure sustainability (BE, HU and SK). Beneficiaries  are required to provide  proof of 
financial support according to sustainability principles (CZ and PL). The sustainability of actions 
is also ensured through the specialised training of staff117, information sharing through networks 
meant  to  improve  the  exchange  of  best  practice  and  cooperation  mechanisms  that  helped 
improve  the  expertise,  knowledge  and  qualifications  of  staff  involved  in  managing  and 
implementing  projects.  In  other  cases,  Member  States  have  undertaken  proactive  measures  to 
attempt to extend the lifespan of equipment delivered with ISF-P support, such as special police 
vehicles118. Concerning IT systems and services funded under ISF-P, the sustainability levels of 
their positive effects depends largely on future development needs. 

In addition, the reporting requirements on long-term sustainability of results were also envisaged 
at the completion stage. In some Member States the responsible authorities organise onsite visits 
and checks to validate the requests coming from beneficiaries for sustainable project results119. 

For Union actions, the diverse range of measures implemented to ensure the sustainability of the 
projects’ results relate to internal codes and mutually agreed commitments, multiplication effects 
of training, awareness raising at political level and wide dissemination of results. 

ISF-P funded projects tend to be aligned with national priorities or are developed in response to 
requirements  that  result  from  implementing  EU  regulations.  Priorities  that  have  already  been 
allocated funding from the national budgets are often complemented or further developed using 
ISF-P  funding120.  Thus,  this  approach  is  seen  to  guarantee  sustainability  because  the  costs  for 
sustaining the respective investments (e.g. IT systems, devices, vehicles) are usually covered by 
the national budgets. 

Some  responsible  authorities  have  developed  relationships  with  all  relevant  stakeholders  for 
programming and implementing the national programmes,  while others use steering groups for 
each  of  the  projects  which  consist  of  different  stakeholders  relevant  to  the  project  scope.  This 
intensive  consultation  process  has  also  included  discussions  on  the  actions’  sustainability  and 
their long-term benefits. However, in some Member States no specific mechanisms for checking 
sustainability were put in place at the programming phase, apart from the common monitoring 

finished  (EE,  LV,  PL  and  DE).  In  other  cases  beneficiaries  were  also  expected  to  plan  their  budgets  for  the 
maintenance  costs  of  the  equipment  procured  with  ISF-P  support,  while  sustainability  duties  and  periods  are 
binding and included in the grant agreements (HU, MT and PL). 

116  ES, HU, NL, MT, PL, RO, PT, EE, FI and BG. 
117  In addition to the delivery of IT systems, specialised equipment and infrastructure components, some responsible 
authorities  mention  that  projects  involving  training  and  qualification  of  staff  also  exhibit  high  sustainability 
levels CY, HR, HU, EL, EE, CZ, ES and FI. Acquiring new skills through training is seen as sustainable as it 
builds  on  both  personal  and  institutional  capacities.  Training  appears  to  be  highly  valued  both  in  delivering 
sustainable  results,  such  as  skills  and  qualifications,  and  as  a  prerequisite  for  achieving  sustainable  effects  in 
delivering IT solutions, systems, specialised equipment and infrastructure. 

118  In Finland, for example, there is a programme whereby vehicles are rotated among police stations or units that 
have  different  levels  of  workload,  in  order  to  ensure  that  workload  is  equally  distributed  over  vehicles,  and 
therefore optimally extending the lifetime  and maintenance costs of vehicle. In Bulgaria the  approach towards 
the same purpose is exactly the opposite –the number of people driving one patrol vehicle is reduced in order to 
instil a better sense of ownership and care in the individual officers for the vehicle. 

119  FR, CZ, MT, PL, BG and RO. 
120  Therefore, post-implementation costs for operation and maintenance of IT systems, equipment, or infrastructure 
are covered by national budgets (national interim evaluation reports CY, BG, DE, NL, SK, RO, HR, FR and EE). 

53 

 
                                                                                                                                                             
and evaluation framework,  either because the responsible authorities considered it unnecessary 
or because such a requirement was absent in their national programmes121. 

The  results  of  the  projects  funded  tend  to  be  sustainable  for  two  main  reasons.  Firstly,  many 
responsible  authorities  consider  projects  involving  the  development  of  IT  systems,  supply  of 
specialised  equipment,  and  infrastructure  as  sustainable  by  nature122.  Secondly,  IT-related 
systems  and  infrastructures  are  continuously  updated  and  maintained  in  order  to  operate 
effectively, while equipment is protected by the manufacturer’s warranty which is cross-checked 
with requirements for the minimum length of targeted use123. 

Finally,  when  considering  the  limitations  in  assessing  actions’  sustainability,  one  important 
aspect  relates  to  the  difficulties  in  measuring  it  due  to  a  lack  of  consistent  monitoring  and 
specific sustainability-related indicators, including over a period of time that extends beyond the 
end of life of projects. Another one relates to actions that are still being implemented, whereby it 
is difficult to establish whether the effects on the target groups and on specific areas will really 
last. 

121  EE, ES, IT, LU, NL, SI and PT. 
122  AT, BE, DE, HR, FR and HU. 
123  LU, AT, HU, HR, IT, MT, DE, MT and LV. 

54 

 
 
 
                                                 
6  CONCLUSIONS AND ISSUES FOR FURTHER CONSIDERATION 

In  this  section,  several  limitations  were  identified,  based  mainly  on  the  short  time  that  has 
elapsed  since  the  beginning  of  the  programme’s  implementation  and  therefore,  the  absence  of 
conclusive results. This has already been claimed in this staff working document and highlighted 
in ISF-P’s interim evaluation. Therefore, the following conclusions and recommendations should 
be considered merely as a means of temporary guidance which show the current state of play as 
of  June  2017.  Therefore,  these  should  be  considered  as  a  tool  in  order  to  better  approach  the 
necessary  corrective  actions  and  ensure  the  ISF-P  is  duly  delivered  as  originally  intended.  In 
addition,  the  interim  evaluation  and  its  main  findings  should  contribute  to  the  formulating  of 
ISF-P’s successor in the context of the post-2020 multi-annual financial framework. 

6.1  Effectiveness 

ISF-P’s effectiveness has been impacted by the newly emerging security threats which, among 
others, raised security challenges caused in particular by the terrorist attacks. Also, ISF-P’s late 
start  and  the  slow  implementation  of  actions  funded  under  the  shared  management  mode  have 
affected the extent to which ISF-P could achieve its objectives. 

The  Fund  contributed  to  a  high  level  of  security  in  the  EU  through  strengthening  the  Member 
States’  capability  to  prevent  and  combat  cross-border,  serious  and  organised  crime,  including 
terrorism.  This  was  done  through  numerous  actions  targeting  areas  such  as  financial  and 
economic  crime,  cybercrime  and  drug  trafficking.  To  achieve  this  objective,  investment  in  IT 
systems  and  operational  equipment  were  the  most  common  action  types  that  Member  States 
selected  under  their  national  programmes.  Cooperation  amongst  Member  States  also  helped  to 
boost  capability  (although  to  a  lesser  degree)  through  exchanging  information  on  cross-border 
crime  and  disseminating  best  practices,  establishing  transnational  networks  and  projects,  and 
Member  States  participating  in  joint  investigation  teams  and  the  European  multidisciplinary 
platform against criminal threats policy cycle. 

The  progress  ISF-P  made  towards  developing  training  schemes  and  exchange  programmes  is 
limited  as  the  number  of  trained  law  enforcement  staff  is  below  the  target  established  in  the 
national  programmes  and  the  Fund’s  contribution  in  third  countries  is  lower  than  expected. 
However, the Member States have programmed and are in the process of implementing measures 
focusing on actions targeting different topics and types of training, in particular in the fields of 
cybercrime and corruption. 

Furthermore, the Fund supported the strengthening of the Member States capacity to manage the 
security-related  risks  and  crises  effectively  through  developing  comprehensive  threat  and  risk 
assessments.  The  progress  made  by  ISF-P  in  protecting  victims  of  crime  as  well  as  protecting 
people  and  critical  infrastructure  against  terrorist  attacks  and  other  security-related  incidents  is 
limited.  The  cooperation  and  coordination  between  national  authorities  was  improved  through 
(i) the establishment of sector-specific early warning systems, (ii) cooperation mechanisms and 
(iii)  the  upgrading  and  procurement  of  equipment  allowing  a  better  response  to  crisis  or 
emergency situations. 

ISF-P  also  made  good  progress  towards  implementing  the  systems  enabling  the  Prüm  Council 
Decision  on automated  data exchange, the passenger  name  record directive,  the biometric data 
capture and exchange as well as the interconnection with the systems of JHA agencies such as 
Europol. 

Issues for further consideration 

55 

 
  To  increase  effectiveness  the  national  programmes  should  be  more  focused.  This  will 

enable Member States to prioritise some objectives that could lead to better results. 

  The Common Monitoring and Evaluation Framework should be improved by introducing 
‘baseline values’ so it can check which specific indicators are relevant at national level 
and thus enable the progress of projects to be appropriately monitored. 

  To improve the cooperation with third countries and EU agencies. 

6.2  Efficiency 

Overall, in the limits of available data, it could be considered that the results of ISF-P so far have 
been  achieved  at  a  reasonable  cost  in  terms  of  both  human  and  financial  resources.  The  
perceived  administrative  burden  is  considered  to  be  the  main  factor  undermining  efficiency. 
Even  if  the  national  programmes  have  been  very  slow  to  begin,  the  Fund’s  overall 
implementation  appears  to  be  on  track  as  emergency  assistance  bridged  the  funding  gap  and 
catered to immediate needs, helped by the flexibility in triggering such emergency actions. 

The  management  and  control  measures  have  been  considered  appropriate  and  efficient,  with 
stringent mechanisms to ensure that fraud and irregularities are prevented effectively 

The  implementation  of  the  national  programmes  started  very  slowly,  creating  challenges  for 
evaluating the cost-effectiveness because the majority of the projects are still ongoing. The low 
levels of human resources costs were associated with the pace at which the national programmes 
are  implemented  in  the  Member  States.  Overall,  the  Member  States  show  a  growing  or  stable 
number  of  full-time  equivalents  over  the  period  2014  to  2017.  DG  HOME’s  human  resources 
have just slightly increased, despite the large increase in value of the emergency assistance and 
the emergency situation on the ground following the migration crisis. 

Efficiency  was  also  ensured  thanks  to  considerable  knowledge  and  expertise  gained  through 
experience from previous projects and the flexibility of the  national programmes. Furthermore, 
national  measures  concerning  the  application,  implementation,  monitoring  and  reporting 
processes  have  been  put  in  place  in  some  Member  States  to  ensure  efficiency.  As  for  the 
management and control measures, they are generally considered as appropriate and effective. 

There are also a number of issues  at Member States  level that are deemed to  negatively  affect 
efficiency: the requirement to allocate minimum percentages to national objectives; complex and 
recurrent reports; common indicators; and the alignment of monitoring calendars. 

Overall, the emergency assistance and the union actions as well as indirect management actions 
have achieved their objectives at a reasonable cost in terms of DG HOME’s financial and human 
resources. 

Issues for further consideration 

  The Common Monitoring and Evaluation Framework with relevant indicators should be 
established  at  the  beginning  of  the  programming  period  addressing,  for  example, 
reporting requirements. 

  A sufficient level of pre-financing payments should be planned to facilitate the successful 

implementation of the national programmes. 

56 

 
6.3  Simplification and reduction of administrative burden 

Overall,  the  measures  implemented  by  ISF-P  for  simplification  and  to  reduce  administrative 
burden have only partially achieved their intended goals. Despite simplification improvements, 
there  is  little  evidence,  at  this  stage,  that  the  administrative  burden  has  been  significantly 
reduced. The multiannual programming enabled emerging needs to be addressed throughout the 
seven-year  timeframe  and  large  investments  to  be  managed  in  the  long  term.  This  helped  to 
reduce  the  administrative  burden  resulting  from  the  annual  implementation  cycle.  Also,  the 
simplified cost option was used in a number of Member States who acknowledged its efficiency 
in  reducing  the  administrative  burden.  However,  further  guidance  is  needed  to  ensure  the 
simplified cost option has a common definition, as this is still not clear to beneficiaries who are 
therefore reluctant to use it. Moreover, the single set of procedures for all areas covered by the 
Fund and for both AMIF and ISF was deemed to have led to simplification. 

However,  the  administrative  burden  is  still  perceived  to  be  substantial  by  both  the  authorities 
responsible  for  managing  the  funds  and  the  beneficiaries.  Even  though  the  national  eligibility 
rules  were  considered  to  provide  more  flexibility  in  managing  the  national  programmes,  they 
actually  added  to  the  administrative  burden.  The  Common  Monitoring  and  Evaluation 
Framework  was  established  too  late,  well  after  the  projects  had  started.  Monitoring,  reporting 
and  verification  measures  are  still  burdensome  and  Member  States  have  asked  for  clearer  and 
more  detailed  guidance  on  how  to  simplify  compliance  with  Commission  requirements.  The 
reporting  requirements  and  the  irrelevance  of  some  common  indicators  were  also  identified  as 
potential factors for increasing the administrative burden. 

Issues for further consideration 

  The multiannual programming should be maintained for future financing periods. 

  The  Common  Monitoring  and  Evaluation  Framework  with  more  relevant  indicators 
should  be  established  at  the  beginning  of  the  programming  period  for  simplifying  the 
processes and calendars. 

6.4  Relevance 

ISF-P  is  relevant  and  its  original  rationale  and  objectives  remain  largely  valid  in  the  recent 
context of heightened security challenges and newly emerging threats. 

The priorities and objectives set by Regulation (EU) 513/2014 have proven to be relevant and are 
still  aligned  to  current  needs  and  to  the  policy  priorities  and  areas  identified  in  the  European 
agenda  on  security  and  by  national  strategies  in  related  fields.  The  needs  identified  during  the 
programming stage did not change significantly during the Fund’s implementation and no new 
need or priority emerged which has not been covered by the Fund. Main mechanisms identified 
to  ensure  the  Fund’s  relevance  included:  (i) the  policy  dialogue  and  the  consultative  method 
adopted during the programming  stage, (ii) the monitoring role played both by the responsible 
authority  and  by  the  Monitoring  Committee,  (iii) the  possibility  of  making  budgetary 
adjustments and transfers, and (iv) the mid-term review of the national programmes. 

The interim evaluation also indicates that the Fund’s scope is broad enough to enable necessary 
actions  to  be  implemented  in  the  areas  of  cross-border  police  cooperation,  preventing  and 
combating  crime  and  crisis  management.  It  has  also  identified  general  law  enforcement 
cooperation and specialised training as actions of particular relevance to the beneficiaries and to 
the Member States needs. In addition, ISF-P support in the areas of radicalisation and protection 

57 

 
from  terrorist  attacks  is  considered  useful  in  a  changing  security  environment  in  Europe  and 
most actions implemented in these areas were relevant. Also, the Fund responds to the need to 
tackle  organised  crime  and  new  forms  of  crime,  such  as  cybercrime,  in  view  of  the 
internationalisation and professionalisation of organised criminal networks. 

Despite the evidence gathered on the Fund’s relevance, more flexibility is needed regarding the 
national  programmes’  implementation.  The  main  issue  was  found  around  the  fragmentation  of 
actions  under  multiple  national  objectives  that  prevented  the  pooling  of  resources  around  key 
priorities and made it difficult to implement cross-objective projects. 

Issues for further consideration 

  The  future  funds  need  to  be  designed  in  a  way  that  enables  them  to  address  a 
comprehensive  set  of  needs,  as  well  as  ensure  flexibility  in  the  case  of  unexpected 
changes. 

  More  guidance  on  how  Member  States  could  focus  on  a  few  operational  objectives 
instead  of  spreading  funds  across  too  many  priorities  which  could  result  in  their 
fragmentation. 

  Promote further the external dimension in order to better address global security threats. 

6.5  Coherence and complementarity 

The  Fund  has  been  coherent  and  complementary  to  other  national  and  EU  interventions.  No 
overlap  has  been  found  between  the  ISF-P  and  national  interventions  in  the  fields  of  fighting 
crime and crisis management. The coherence and complementarity of actions has been ensured 
as they are properly designed according to Member States’ needs assessments, the Fund’s rules, 
and formal and informal coordination mechanisms. The design of the national programmes was 
based  on  a  thorough  policy  dialogue  between  the  Commission  and  the  Member  States,  taking 
account of key needs and priorities as reported at national level. It has also been claimed that the 
monitoring  committee  and  the  responsible  authority  played  an  important  role  in  ensuring 
synergies  and  avoiding  overlaps  between  the  ISF-P  and  other  EU  instruments.  They  did  this 
through  regular  cooperation  (i.e.  mainly  through  inter-service  consultation)  with  other  national 
institutions  implementing  other  funds  (incl.  EU  funds)  and  with  counterparts  in  other  Member 
States to avoid any overlaps and double-funding. 

The  majority  of  Member  States  carried  out  assessments  of  other  EU  interventions  which  took 
place  at  the  programming  stage  in  order  to  ensure  coherence  and  complementarity  with  them. 
Most Member States have also adopted different coordinating mechanisms at the implementation 
stage to ensure coherence and complementarity with similar interventions carried out under other 
EU  funds.  These  mechanisms  include  inter-institutional  exchange  of  information  and 
cooperation among authorities responsible for different EU funds. However, there is potential for 
greater synergies between actions implemented under ISF-P and other EU-funded programmes, 
particularly  in  relation  to  Horizon  2020,  Hercule  III  and  the  rights,  equality  and  citizenship 
programme  in  the  areas  of  (i) research  and  development  of  technologies,  (ii) the  fight  against 
economic crime and (iii) the support and protection of victims. 

The  complementarity  among  the  Fund’s  different  implementation  modes  (shared,  direct, 
indirect)  has  also  been  ensured.  Direct  and  indirect  management  are  generally  designed  and 
implemented to improve and complement the interventions under the national programmes or to 
fund  those  which  cannot  be  implemented  under  shared  management.  In  particular,  the 
emergency assistance actions address emerging and unpredictable needs arising from emergency 

58 

 
situations  which  are  difficult  to  be  funded  under  the  national  programmes  due  to  allocation 
limits.  However,  there  is  some  room  for  improvement  since  it  seems  that  project  beneficiaries 
are not very aware of other actions carried out under ISF-P. Also, the activities of the relevant 
EU  agencies  should  be  more  aligned  to  similar  activities  carried  out  under  ISF-P  to  avoid 
duplication  and  ensure  synergies.  These  agencies  should  be  more  actively  included  in  the 
implementation and monitoring of the national programmes. 

Issues for further consideration 

  The future Funds should have a similar format (i.e. the national programmes that aim to 
build  long-term  capacities,  emergency  assistance  that  aims  to  alleviating  immediate 
pressure,  and  the  union  actions  being  clearly  and  logically  designed  to  support  each 
other). 

  Strengthen  internal  coherence  between  the  national  programmes  and  the  union  actions  

and boost the dissemination of information on Union actions at national level. 

  Further strengthen the synergies between ISF-P and other EU interventions. 

6.6  EU Added Value 

Overall  ISF-P  has  generated  EU  added  value  by  enabling  cross-border  projects  to  be 
implemented by encouraging operational cooperation and mutual learning. It has also improved: 
(i) the information exchange, (ii) dissemination of best practices, (iii) the trust amongst Member 
States  law  enforcement  authorities  and  (iv)  the  implementation  of  EU  IT  systems  at  national 
level (and has contributed to their harmonisation at EU level). The Fund’s EU added value was 
also  ensured  through  staff  training  and  the  purchase  of  specialised  equipment,  both  of  which 
were  considered  to  be  very  relevant.  Moreover,  the  Fund  is  considered  to  have  broadened  the 
scope  of  existing  national  interventions,  which  would  have  been  delayed  or  have  not  been 
implemented at the same scale or within the same timeframe with national funding. Also, some 
actions  would  not  have  been  implemented  at  all  without  ISF-P  support  as  they  were  not 
considered as national priorities. The absence of ISF-P funding would also have been detrimental 
to the quality of the EU response to cross-border cooperation and to the ability of Member States 
to implement innovative solutions. 

As regards direct management, without the resources provided for the emergency assistance and  
union  actions,  national  funding  would  have  led  to  a  much  more  difficult  and  smaller-scale 
implementation,  with  a  lower  general  impact.  The  Fund’s  main  advantages  come  from  the 
transnational  dimension  of  union  actions  as  well  as  the  harmonisation of  research on  forensics 
and crime prevention at EU level. The benefits entailed by these measures also included higher 
cooperation  both  across  and  within  Member  States  attained  through  the  financing  of  EU 
professional networks (e.g. ATLAS, CARIN) which boosted the sharing of information, know-
how and good practices as well as the private-public collaboration. This allowed for the timely 
and efficient handling of new security challenges and related emergencies. The discontinuation 
of  union  actions’  support  would  have  resulted  in  the  loss  of  expertise  sharing  between  the 
partners and Member States participating in joint activities. 

  Further  encourage  the  transnational  component  of  eligible  actions  under  the  national 

programmes. 

  Further  increase  the  efforts  to  systematically  disseminate  the  project  results  and  best 
practices across the EU to allow for mutual learning and for the EU added value of the 
actions to be strengthened. 

59 

 
6.7  Sustainability 

The sustainability of effects is ensured by most ISF-P funded projects as the actions are usually 
aligned  with  and  complementary  to  national  priorities  and  EU  requirements,  so  they  are 
generally planned with a view to remain operational beyond the Fund’s support. A wide range of 
measures  to  ensure  the  sustainability  of  projects’  results  are  in  place  for  shared  and  direct 
management.  For  this  purpose,  measures  such  as  evaluating  project  sustainability,  ensuring 
maintenance and follow-up costs (e.g. for IT systems) and establishing minimum requirements 
for warranty and duration of targeted use are envisaged. 

The sustainability of actions is also ensured through: the specialised training of staff; information 
sharing  through  networks  to  improve  the  exchange  of  best  practices;  and  other  cooperation 
mechanisms  that  contributed  to  improving  expertise,  knowledge  and  qualification  of  staff 
involved in managing and implementing projects.  

In  other  cases,  proactive  measures  were  carried  out  by  some  Member  States  to  extend  the 
lifespan of equipment provided with the Fund’s support (e.g. special police vehicles). 

Some Member States have developed an intensive consultation process between the responsible 
authorities  and  all  relevant  stakeholders  at  the  programming  and  implementation  stages  of  the 
national programmes. This process also included discussions on the sustainability of actions and 
their long-term benefits, while other Member States did not develop any specific mechanism for 
assessing  sustainability  either  because  the  responsible  authorities  considered  it  unnecessary  or 
because the national programmes did not required it. 

Issues for further consideration 

  Consider  the  possibility  of  introducing  specific  monitoring  indicators  relating  to 

sustainability to better assess it across all Member States. 

 

Invest effort in disseminating results and best practices to ensuring sustainable results. 

60 

 
 
 
 
ANNEX 1: PROCEDURAL INFORMATION 

Leading Directorate-General 
Participating units of DG HOME  A2 — Legal Affairs 

DG HOME 

Participating DGs in ISSG  

Legal base 

firm 

the  Better 

Roadmap approval 
Decide planning  
Exceptions 
to 
Regulation guidelines 
External 
consulting 
specialised in evaluation 
Number of Inter-Service Steering 
Group meetings 
Last deliverable handed in 
Approval  of  the  final  report  by 
Steering Group 
Regulatory Scrutiny Board (RSB) 
meeting  
Resubmission of the SWD to the 
RSB 

D1 — Police cooperation and information exchange 
D2 — Terrorism and radicalisation 
D3 — Organised crime and drugs policy 
D4 — Cybercrime 
E1 — Union Actions 
E2  —  National  programmes  for  south  and  east  Europe, 

evaluation, AMF/ISF Committee 

E3  —  National  programmes  for  north  and  west  Europe, 

MFF, Evaluations 

Secretariat-General 
DG BUDG 
DG JUST 
DG TAXUD 
According to Art. 57 of Regulation (EU) No 514/2014, the 
Commission  shall  submit  to  the  European  Parliament,  to 
the  Council,  to  the  European  Economic  and  Social 
Committee  and  to  the  Committee  of  the  Regions  an 
interim evaluation report of ISF-P at the level of the Union 
by 30 June 2018. 
11 April 2017 
PLAN/2017/891 
None noted  

Contract  signed  in  September  2017  with  ICF  Consulting 
Services Limited, UK.  
3 meetings (last on: 1 February 2018) 

9 March 2018 (Final report for acceptance) 

18 April 2018 

61 

 
 
 
 
 
 
ANNEX 2: METHODS AND ANALYTICAL METHODS 

This  annex  presents  the  methodology  employed  for  the  ISF-P’s  interim  evaluation,  including 
discussion  on  the  challenges  experienced,  and  the  mitigation  strategies  employed  to  deal  with 
them. 

The  overall  methodology  has  been  based  on  a  mixed-method  approach  addressing  the  various 
components  of  the  Fund  including  desk  research  of  programme  documentation,  consultations 
with  programme  stakeholders  via  surveys  and  interviews  as  well  as  consultations  with 
beneficiaries using a case study approach. Analytical exercises include analyses of the targeted 
stakeholder  surveys,  of  programme  data  as  well  as  descriptive  quantitative  and  qualitative 
analyses. 

The external study was divided into three phases: inception, interim and final: 

  The purpose of the inception stage was to prepare the evaluation work to be carried out, and 
to ensure that the Steering Group and the contractor shared a common understanding of the 
study’s  scope  and  objectives.  The  activities  planned  in  the  inception  stage  included  initial 
desk  research,  explorative  interviews  with  DG  HOME  officials,  refining  the  methodology 
and developing data collection tools. This stage culminated in the production of the inception 
report,  which  was  discussed  during  a  meeting  with  the  Steering  Group  on  the  24 October 
2017, revised and then approved on 27 November. 

  The purpose of the interim phase was mostly to collect data. The activities planned in the 
interim stage included desk research, in-depth interviews, case studies, meta-analysis of the 
national  interim  reports,  forward-looking  workshop  with  the  Evaluation  Network  and  the 
analysis  of  the  legal  base.  This  stage  culminated  in  the  production  of  the  interim  report, 
which  was  discussed  during  a  meeting  with  the  Steering  Group  on  15 December  2017, 
revised and then approved on 22 February 2018. 

  The purpose of the final phase was to synthesise the data gathered, triangulate findings and 
provide  conclusions  on  the  evaluation  questions  and  recommendations.  The  activities 
planned in the final stage included filling gaps in the data and refining the report, analysing 
the targeted consultation, and workshops. This stage culminated in the production of the draft 
final  report,  which  was  discussed  during  a  meeting  with  the  Steering  Group  on  1 February 
2018, and is still being revised. 

Therefore, the Inter-Service  Steering Group has met for a fourth  time to  discuss the draft staff 
working documents. 

Desk research was carried out during the inception phase in order to identify and assess relevant 
data sources that can feed into the analysis. The main point of reference was all data accessible 
through SFC2014 (for the national programmes), as well as additional data available on budget, 
the emergency assistance, union actions etc. 

The in-depth interviews focused on the union actions and the emergency assistance, as well as 
aspects  related  to  internal  and  external  coherence  and  complementarity  with  other  EU  funding 
instruments.  In  total,  the  contractor  conducted 48  in-depth  telephone  or  face-to-face  interviews 
(excluding  interviews  for  the  case  studies).  The  interviews  were  carried  out  using  semi-
structured interview guides, including a number of pre-defined themes and questions. 

62 

 
Building  on  the  desk-based  work  assessing  the  degree  of  complementarity  and  coherence 
between  the  ISF-P  and  other  EU  financial  instruments’  legal  acts,  interviews  were  conducted 
with representatives of other EU financial instruments (at EU level) that could have a possible 
impact on asylum seekers and refugees, on integration and on return. The coded data was then 
analysed and included in the main deliverables through a process of data triangulation. 

The purpose of the case studies was to provide in-depth analyses of the interventions, allowing 
for good and bad practices to be identified and any weaknesses to be mitigated. The focus of the 
case studies was on the emergency assistance, though the responsible authorities in the countries 
concerned  were  also  asked  more  general  questions  on  the  Fund’s  implementation  and  the 
complementarity of the emergency assistance with the national programmes. 

The objective of the meta-evaluation of national interim evaluation reports was to make an 
aggregate  assessment  of  how  national  interventions  contributed  overall.  The  national  interim 
reports were submitted through SFC2014 by the responsible authorities by the end of December 
2017. 

A forward-looking workshop was organised on the fringes of the evaluation network meeting 
on  30  November  with  representatives  of  the  responsible  authorities  and  the  Member  States 
evaluators. 

The purpose of analysing the legal base was to consider whether the ISF-P’s legal basis is an 
obstacle to the Fund’s effectiveness, efficiency and relevance. 

The final phase of the study included a process of filling gaps in the data and a refinement of 
the  answers  to  the  evaluation  questions.  Conclusions  were  drawn  per  evaluation  criterion, 
drawing  on  the  triangulated  results  of  the  evaluation.  Recommendations  for  the  Fund’s  future 
and the next funding period were then developed. 

A  compilation  and  analysis  of  the answers  received  through  the  targeted  consultation  (which 
replaced the open public consultation that was originally planned) has been conducted. 

In  preparing  for  the  finalisation  tasks,  the  contractor  held  an  internal  workshop  involving  a 
brainstorming  session  with  members  of  the  core  team  and  the  evaluative  and  thematic  quality 
assurance  experts  on 
in  preliminary  conclusions  and 
recommendations.  The  main  purpose  of  this  validation  workshop  was  to:  (i)  validate  the 
conclusions;  (ii)  revise  the  recommendations  to  best  fit  the  roles  of  stakeholders;  (iii)  address 
technical  and  legislative  constraints  and  feasibility  concerns;  and  (iv)  establish  an  order  of 
priority among the key recommendations and validate this list. 

findings,  which 

resulted 

the 

Basis on the work described above, the final report for review and acceptance was prepared and 
compiled. 

63 

 
 
 
 
ANNEX 3: STAKEHOLDER CONSULTATION 

ISF-P  had  a  consultation  strategy  whose  objective  was  to  gather  input  from  stakeholders 
(evidence, data, as well as views and opinions) and ensure that all of them have the opportunity 
to present their views to the Commission on how well the existing programmes have performed 
and  the  extent  to  which  they  met  the  EU’s  objectives  in  these  areas.  Stakeholders’  input  was 
sought  to  provide  the  Commission  with  valuable  insights  on  how  well  the  current  funds  are 
performing, including on the challenges related to their implementation. 

This  open  consultation,  as  provided  for  in  the  Better  Regulation  guidelines  and  the  interim 
evaluation’s consultation strategy, was meant for the general public and to be published for 12 
weeks  on  the  Commission’s  portal124.  In  parallel,  the  Commission  general  directorates  and 
services  have  worked  on  the  future  multi-annual  financial  framework  in  clusters,  setting  up  a 
streamlined  consultation  that  covered  questions  on  both  the  past  and  the  future  of  the 
programmes. Launching a specific consultation for the mid-term evaluations could have created 
confusion  and  not  provided  much  added  value  compared  to  the  broader  exercise.  153  answers 
and 52 position papers have been received in this context. 

Therefore,  the  open  public  consultation  for  the  interim  evaluation  was  replaced  by  a  targeted 
consultation  which  eventually  was  used  to  contextualise  the  findings.  The  questionnaires  were 
aimed at the beneficiaries of union actions and emergency assistance and were made available in 
English, French and German. This targeted consultation run for 8 weeks and ended on 9 January 
2018 and received input from only 23 participants. 

The results of the targeted consultation are presented below: 

  Of the 23 answers received, a little bit more than the half of the respondents (12) answered the survey as 

individuals in their professional capacity whereas only one respondent provided answers as an individual in his 
personal capacity. The rest of respondents (10) answered to the survey representing an organisation. Of these, 
17 represented a public authority (13 national, 2 regional, 1 local and 1 responsible), 2 were from 
academic/research institutions, 2 from non-profit organisations and 2 from other type of organisations. All the 
respondents, apart from one, have benefited from ISF-P funding during the period 2014-2017. 14 respondents 
rated their knowledge of the Fund as “good”, 4 as “very good”, 4 respondents as “limited” and 1 as “very 
limited”. 

  The first part of the consultation concerned the importance of the specific objectives of ISF-P for the policy 

priorities in the Member States (preventing and combating crime, exchange of information, training schemes, 
protecting and supporting victims of crime, protecting critical infrastructure, developing comprehensive threat 
and risk assessments and effective coordination between sector-specific early warning and crisis cooperation 
actors). The most important specific objective is “preventing and combating crime” (17 answers as “very 
important”) followed by “exchange of information” (16 answers). Generally, all the objectives are considered of 
a great importance (significant percentage of “important” as an answer), while no specific objective was rated 
as “not important”. Only a small number (5 answers) of respondents answered “don’t know” regarding all the 
specific objectives. 

  The second part of the consultation concerned the extent at which the actions financed by ISF-P in the Member 
States contribute to the Fund's objectives (preventing and combating crime, exchange of information, training 
schemes, protecting and supporting victims of crime, protecting critical infrastructure, developing 
comprehensive threat and risk assessments and effective coordination between sector-specific early warning 
and crisis cooperation actors). 21 respondents considered that ISF-P does contribute to “preventing and 
combating crime” (1 to some extent, 12 to a great extent and 8 fully). 18 respondents considered that ISF-P 
contributes to “exchange of information” (2 to some extent, 9 to a great extent and 7 fully). 17 respondents 
considered the ISF-P contributes to “training” (7 to some extent, 5 to a great extent and 5 fully).   12 
respondents considered that ISF-P does contribute to “protecting and supporting victims of crime” (5 to some 
extent, 5 to a great extent and 2 fully), while the others don’t know, except for one who answered “not at all”. 
11 respondents considered that ISF-P contributes to “protecting critical infrastructure” (4 to some extent, 4 to a 

124  http://ec.europa.eu/info/consultations_en 

64 

 
                                                 
great extent and 3 fully), while the others don’t know, except for 2 who answered “not at all”. 12 respondents 
considered that ISF-P does contribute to the “effective coordination between sector-specific early warning and 
crisis cooperation actors” (3 to some extent, 7 to a great extent and 2 fully), while the others don’t know, except 
for one who answered “not at all”. 19 respondents considered that ISF-P contributes to “developing 
comprehensive threat and risk assessments” (5 to some extent, 12 to a great extent and 2 fully).  

  When evaluating the responsiveness of the ISF-P support in addressing new/emerging needs, a little bit than the 

half of the respondents (12) argued that the ISF-P’s responsiveness is to some extent flexible whereas 8 
respondents replied that ISF-P support is fully flexible. On the contrary, the remaining 3 respondents have not a 
specific opinion on this topic (“don’t know”).  

  Regarding preventing and combating crime, 17 respondents considered that ISF-P’s contribution was very 

positive on how their country works in this area. With regard to crisis management, 10 respondents did not rate 
ISF-P influence on how their country works in this area and opted for the “don’t know” answer. Generally, it 
can be said that the ISF-P has a positive influence on the crisis management processes in participants’ countries 
(5 to some extent, 5 to a great extent and 1 fully). However, 2 respondents said that ISF-P has not at all a 
positive influence on the way that their country deals with crisis management.   

  Concerning the cooperation between Member States in the field of preventing and combating crime, most of the 
respondents considered that the Fund contributes to improve the cooperation between their country and other 
Member States (21 positive answers). For crisis management, even though 9 respondents considered that the 
cooperation was improved through ISF-P, more that the half of the respondents (12) answered that they don’t 
know. 

  Regarding whether the EU policies in the fields of preventing and combating crime and crisis management 
would have been implemented without the support of ISF-P, the general prevalent opinion is that these EU 
policies could have been implemented outside the ISF-P scope but mostly to some extent (12 answers for the 
first field and 7 for the second one). Regarding the field of crisis management, 12 respondents don’t know if 
these EU policies would have been implemented without ISF-P support. In both fields, one respondent 
considered that they would have been implemented anyway.  

  Looking at ISF-P so far, respondents considered that the Fund promotes new actions that were not delivered in 
their country before in the fields of preventing and combating crime (10) and crisis management (only 2). More 
than the half of respondents (10 and 21 respectively) did not know how to answer these questions. Only 3 
considered that ISF-P does not promote any new actions in the field of preventing and combating crime. 

  Based on the answers, the ISF-P funded projects have a greater impact in helping beneficiaries to better prevent 
and combat crime in comparison to better protect people and infrastructures against security risks (22 positive 
answers for the first field and 13 for the second one).  

  Compared to the previous programming period, 9 respondents did not know to rate the easiness of the 

implementation of ISF-P actions and projects. However, 8 respondents considered that it is generally easier to 
implement ISF-P actions and projects but there are some negative aspects, while 5 respondents found it much 
easier. No respondent answered that ISF-P hardens the implementation, but one respondent said that the 
implementation is generally harder, although there are some positive aspects. 

  In what concerns the degree at which actions financed by ISF-P are coherent with actions and projects funded 

by national resources in the field of preventing and combating crime, the majority of respondents were positive 
(17), with the rest not being able to answer. With regard to crisis management, only 9 respondents gave a 
positive answer, while 14 were not able to answer. 

  Regarding sustainability, 11 respondents considered that only a few actions funded under ISF-P would continue 
without the EU financial support. 7 respondents said that some of ISF-P actions could continue without EU 
financial support, while 3 considered that almost all the actions would be sustained anyway. 

  With regard to the achievement of the objectives in the absence of ISF-P, 14 respondents considered that only a 

few objectives would have been achieved. 3 respondents said that the objectives would have been almost 
impossible to achieve without ISF-P support and, on the contrary, other 4 considered that some of the objectives 
would have been reached anyway. Only 2 respondents were not able to answer. 

In  addition  to  this,  the  evaluation  reflected  the  results  of  a  forward-looking  workshop  with 
representatives  of  responsible  authorities  and  the  Member  States  evaluators.  Its  results  are 
presented below: 

Issues to be considered 

  Experience so far (prompt: relevance regarding national strategies on fight against crime; planning and 

programming process, eligibility of actions; monitoring and evaluation systems and mechanism; efficiency)  
  Innovations put in place by ISF-P did deliver their intended effects (multiannual programming, simplified cost 

option)? 

  Success stories (relevance, effectiveness, EU added value)  

65 

 
 
  Indicators you have used to measure progress and success. Common indicators have been useful? 
  Obstacles encountered and what strategies to address them 
  What to recommend the Commission regarding the future of ISF-P? 

Relevance 
Correspondence of the objectives to the actual needs 

  During the morning session, many participants commented that the Programme remains highly relevant to the 

needs. 

  Scope is very broad and covers over 22 crime areas. One Member State commented that the very broad scope of 

ISF-P allows to cover national needs.  

  Other Member State noted that in terms of the areas under crisis and risk prevention, the scope has been vague 
and ambiguous instructions have been received from the Commission on the scope, so clearer guidance should 
be given in this respect. 

Does the Programme focus on too many specific areas/priorities? Does this result in fragmentation or is the 
flexibility needed? 

  Two Member States commented that they did not want their national programmes to be focused on so many 

areas. However, as a result of the policy dialogues, more areas had to be added. In addition, it is very difficult to 
decide what is more important in the security area.  

  Other Member State opined that the flexibility is very important as each country has its own needs and specific 

crime issues and the Programme should cover all types of priorities.  

  Certain Member State commented that flexibility is needed considering the volatility and the ever changing 
need of the security field. Also, within a period of 7 years it is important to have flexibility as security is a 
dynamic area and future challenges and priorities are very difficult to predict. 

  Other Member State mentioned that the fragmentation and diversity of projects depends on the number of 

stakeholders involved in the implementation of the project. Several stakeholders were involved in the delivery 
of the same projects which predisposes this fragmentation of national programme and actions related to ISF-P.  
  Several Member States agreed that the scope of the Programme should remain flexible and broad but Member 

States should not be encouraged to spread too much across all priorities.  

What is in place at national level to assess the needs in the field quite frequently to change the way in which 
you are going to use ISF-P? 

  One Member State emphasized the need to continually assess and to amend the national programme and to take 

into account decisions or additional allocations on the basis of needs of the EU.  

  Other Member State intends to propose that some of the actions fall out – invest in financial investigation and 

international and cross-border cooperation – priorities which are shifting from the programming period. 

Relevance of eligible actions  

  Most Member States considered that everything listed in Art. 4 of the legal base is relevant.  

Relevance of funding instruments (i.e. national programmes, Union actions, technical assistance and emergency 
assistance) 

  One Member State commented that around 70% of the union actions are pre-allocated to direct awards (e.g. to 

agencies) and this leaves less funds for calls for proposals.   

  Other Member States commented that all networks are very much used and highly valued and national 

authorities take them into account. 

Coherence 
Scope for complementarity and overlap 

  One Member State reported that distinguishing the scope of the area of risk and protection has been 

challenging. (man-made vs natural disasters). There were some potential overlapping areas with the union civil 
protection mechanism (UCPM) and the instructions from the Commission were seen as vague. This created 
difficulties in planning.  

  Other Member State agreed on this point regarding the scope within risk crisis. There should be no overlap, but 

it has not been an easy task and the confusion comes in the annex of ISF-P as there are certain types of 
priorities, e.g. one of them says that it is an action that links together civil protection and law enforcement 
officers – law enforcement and civil protection. It was considered that ISF-P should really focus on mad-made 
disaster. 

  Examples of EU programmes with potential for scope overlapping: Horizon 2020, social funds related to victim 

services, UCPM, anti-corruption programme as part of the structural funds.  

  One Member State gave the example of ISF-BV where border control information is very often used for police 

purposes (e.g. in criminal cases and travelers to Syria). 

66 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Mechanisms to ensure coherence at national level 

  It was mentioned that Member States have regular committees with representatives of other funds to ensure that 
there is no overlapping. In addition, beneficiaries are obliged to provide declarations twice that there are no 
overlaps of fund – in the application and during implementation. 

Efficiency 
Flexibility of Multiannual programming  

  All participants agreed that the multi-annual programming brought flexibility which has been appreciated by the 

Member States. 

Monitoring of indicators  

  Participants reported issues with regard to the relevance of indicators; difficulty to collect data and 

meaningfulness. Furthermore, participants commented that it was difficult to see the link of indicators with 
project activities. Sometimes aggregate figures were available only. 

  One Member State explained that indicators are sometimes not so relevant and, even the  data is collected, it is 

difficult to assess the effect of the Fund and difficult to establish attribution effects. – e.g. kg of drugs vs 
number of seizures (seizures can be big or small so that is meaningless). It is also very difficult to do 
estimations. Furthermore, research-based evidence needs to give justification while the number is shrinking in 
terms of drugs collected – less seizures and kg of drugs detected may mean that the policies are working.    

  Taking into account the broad scope of ISF-P and broad national programmes and the fact that each country sets 

its own priorities, the activities take place sometimes only in some areas but it is still needed to collect 
indicators in all other areas which does not make sense. 

  It is a little early for impact indicators as the current programmes are at too early stage to produce any such 

results. 

Reporting difficulties of calendar year vs reporting year  

  All participants agreed on this point that the discrepancy between reporting and calendar year results in 

difficulties and confusion. 

  One Member State noted that calendar from October to October does not make things easier as it provides a 

different calendar and makes it more complex for beneficiaries. 

Late start with the Programme implementation and absorption capacity 

  Shift from centralised to decentralised – had to build administrative capacity (regional agencies). Member 
States commented that the national programmes usually started slowly and managing and responsible 
authorities have limited amount of resources at the very end of the programme while the beneficiaries are in full 
swing of implementation after its end. This mid-term evaluation is premature due to the slow start of the 
national programmes and it would have made sense to do it next year. The issue of what will be the timeframe 
for the interim evaluation should encompassed at the end of the process and maybe should have started at the 
beginning with the development of different indicators. 

  For ISF-P, the shift from central administration to decentralised one meant that Member States had to set up the 

responsible authority from scratch and develop the forms. 

Advantages and disadvantages of calls for proposals vs direct awards in the national programmes 

  One Member State mentioned that in the area of ISF-P there are a lot of ‘monopoly’ bodies and they are the 

only ones able to implement the actions – e.g. there is only one border police.  

  Some Member States work with direct awards to support big and large investment projects which would not 

have been able to be financed without ISF-P support. At the same time, Member States use open calls to get a 
broader range of actions to reach other actors involved in security related issues. In Member Sates’ experience, 
this is very good to generate innovation particularly in areas where there is no activity yet – e.g. in the area of 
prevention of radicalisation.  

  One Member State used actions to encourage participation of regional law enforcement agencies. In the past the 

central forces aimed to benefit from such funds but with ISF-P they are able to reach the regional level. 

Administrative burden/simplification measures 

  One Member State mentioned that most of the requirements have to be streamlined. The Commission is sending 
out different questionnaires but there are the same people completing similar requests. This creates an important 
burden and the responsible authorities are also busy with commitments and payments, evaluations, etc. 
  When it comes to the reporting, it is too cumbersome in comparison to what is at national level and even in 

respect to the amount of outputs. 

  One Member State noted the regulatory framework was negotiated years before the actual implementation 

starts. 

67 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
  Some Member States considered that more guidance from the Commission on the designation process is 

needed. Some guidelines came later and this created some insecurity for the responsible and audit authorities. 

  The possibility of multi-disciplinary projects in combining funds from AMIF and ISF was suggested. 
  Certain Member State suggested to extend the operating support to AMIF and ISF-P.  
  There is a clear improvement in comparison to previous funds – e.g. positive SFC2014. 
  De-commitment is de facto 9.5 months. One Member State suggested that this period should be expanded. 
  One Member State mentioned the possibility to increase the financial allocation to the police cooperation field. 

EU added value 

  Strong EU-added value is seen in the Programme. 
  Cross-border element is not easy to implement under national programmes. Two Member States commented 
that the cross-border aspect was somewhat lost – ISF-P implementation modes discourage cross-border and 
multi-country initiatives (shared management vs direct management).  

  Other Member State said that a lot of the added value is seen in cross-border exchange programmes. Scope 
should be broader than the national territory; however, if an action has to be managed together with another 
Member State, it is difficult to implement it. There are no facilitating specific mechanisms for this laid down in 
the Programme. There is a need of more cross-border cooperation between Member States and with third 
countries and it is not an easy topic to address with the national programmes.  

  Certain Member State noted that without the ISF-P support not so much regional police will be represented. 
Changes were made in order to make better representation at the end – e.g. participation of regional police in 
special trainings, forensic seminars, etc. Without ISF-P support, the participation in these trainings would be 
much lower. 

  Other Member State noted that in terms of specific equipment, e.g. for specific surveillance needs, it is difficult 
to select one or two specific products from the market. However, with the help of the Fund this opportunity was 
given and the best equipment has been selected. 

  One Member State commented that innovative projects would have not been implemented to this extent without 
ISF-P support. Other projects would have been reduced in scope due to the difficulty to secure national funding. 

  Another Member State noted that long-term investments are difficult to make, but ISF-P allows to invest in 

prevention which is often underfinanced as it doesn’t have the same priority as prosecution. 

  Other Member State mentioned that often terrorism receives more national funding than organised crime which 

is also relevant, but thanks to ISF-P support this area has received proper funding as well. 

  One Member State noted that perhaps cross border, organised and serious crimes could be financed separately 

under different streams. Other Member State disagreed as this implies segregation and not flexibility. 

Effectiveness 
Are Member States on course to achieve objectives? 

  One Member State noted that they are on course to achieve the objectives, but there might be some delays for 

some projects and beneficiaries may ask their projects to be prolonged. 

  Several Member States reported a slow start and issues in implementation and that the interim evaluation comes 
a bit too early as most Member States are at the beginning of the implementation of their national programmes 
and only few projects have been completed so far. 

  Certain Member State mentioned that based on the projects in place so far the objectives of the national 

programme will be achieved. Sometimes it is more a question of waiting for the equipment to be delivered.  
  Other Member State reported that projects are completely on track. For projects in the area of crime prevention, 

it is difficult to assess the effectiveness and measure prevention.  

  In another Member State the beneficiaries chose the common indicators to report on their projects and 

sometimes they chose the easiest indicators to apply.  

Success factors: Which type of projects/actions (or particular projects) have worked effectively so far and why 
this has been the case and which have not?  

  One Member State mentioned that there are 2 projects that are considered as successful. These are the project 

relating to passenger name record and the one on training of project officers to detect early signs of 
radicalisation. Prisons could be centres where radicalisation spreads very easily and thus the project aims to 
detect early signs of radicalisation in prisons.  

  In another Member State, a project related to training on chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear 

explosives is considered as a success story.  

  Other Member State reported two success stories. One project in cooperation in Eastern Europe to fight against 

crime (more than 30 networks) and a project on training in the field of financial criminality. 

Obstacles which hamper effectiveness 

Some Member States mentioned that the national rules for public procurement are sometimes cumbersome. 

68 

 
 
 
 
 
 
This targeted consultation has complemented the interviews and online surveys run in parallel by 
the consultant, and the table below provides an overview of the response rate. The results of all 
those  consultations  have  been  used  to  answer  and  contextualise  the  answers  to  the  evaluation 
questions. 

Overview of stakeholder consultation plan 

Stakeholder type 

Consultation method 

Planned no. of 
stakeholders  

Consultations 
undertaken 

NATIONAL PROGRAMMES  

Responsible authorities  

Interviews (telephone and face-to-face) with all 
participating Member States in the Programme 
(all MS except DK and UK) 

26 interviews  

26 interviews  

Project coordinators 
(beneficiaries under national 
programmes) 

Survey  

*RAs were asked to disseminate the survey at 
national level  

Project participants  

Survey  

*RAs were asked to disseminate the survey at 
national level  

**Not considered due to statistically 
insignificant no. of responses 

UNION ACTIONS 

Project coordinators 
(beneficiaries of Union 
actions) 

Survey and interviews in some Member States 
in conjunction with case studies  

Project partners (co-
beneficiaries) 

Survey 

Project participants  

Survey 

EMERGENCY ACTIONS  

Survey open to project 
coordinators  

 38 responses  

Survey open to project 
participants 

1 complete response and 3 
incomplete responses  

Survey open to all project 
participants 
Interviews  

 26 completed  interviews  

Survey open to all (snowballing 
approach) 

16 responses  

Survey open to all (snowballing 
approach) 

1 complete response and 3 
incomplete responses  

2.1. Project coordinators  

Interviews with project coordinators of all 
awarded actions 

3 interviews  

3 interviews  

EU LEVEL STAKEHOLDERS  

EU agencies and services  

Interviews with Europol, CEPOL, eu-LISA, 
ENISA, EMCDDA and JRC 

6 interviews 

3 interviews  

Programme management of 
other EU Programmes  

Interviews  

11 Programmes (up to 10 
interviews) 

5 interviews  

69 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
ANNEX 4: EVALUATION QUESTIONS 

Effectiveness 

How did the Fund contribute to the achievement of the general objective  defined in Regulation 
(EU) No 513/2014? 

(a) How did the Fund contribute to the following specific objectives: 

- Prevention of cross-border, serious and organised crime, including terrorism? 

-  Reinforcement  of  the  coordination  and  cooperation  between  law  enforcement  authorities  and 
other  national  authorities  of  Member  States,  including  with  Europol  or  other  relevant  Union 
bodies, and with relevant third countries and international organisations? 

(i)  What  progress  was  made  towards  the  achievement  of  the  expected  results  of  strengthening 
Member  States’  capability  to  combat  cross-border,  serious  and  organised  crime,  including 
terrorism and to reinforce their mutual cooperation in this field, and how did the Fund contribute 
to the achievement of this progress? 

(ii)  What  progress  was  made  towards  developing  administrative  and  operational  coordination 
and  cooperation  among  Member  States’  public  authorities,  Europol  or  other  relevant  Union 
bodies and, where appropriate, with third Countries and international organisations, and how did 
the Fund contribute to the achievement of this progress? 

(iii)  What  progress  was  made  towards  developing  training  schemes,  such  as  those  regarding 
technical and professional skills and knowledge of obligations on human rights and fundamental 
freedoms,  in  implementation  of  EU  training  policies,  including  through  specific  Union  law 
enforcement exchange programmes, and how did the Fund contribute to the achievement of this 
progress? 

(iv) What progress was made towards putting in place measures, safeguard mechanisms and best 
practices for the identification and support of witnesses and victims of crime, including victims 
of terrorism, and how did the Fund contribute to the achievement of this progress? 

(b) How did the Fund contribute to improve the capacity of Member States to manage effectively 
security-related risks and crises, and protecting people and critical infrastructure against terrorist 
attacks and other security-related incidents? 

(i) What progress was made towards reinforcing Member States’ administrative and operational 
capability to protect critical infrastructure in all sectors of economic activity, including through 
public-private partnerships and improved coordination, cooperation, exchange and dissemination 
of know-how and  experience  within the Union and with  relevant third Countries, and how did 
the Fund contribute to the achievement of this progress? 

(ii)  What  progress  was  made  towards  establishing  secure  links  and  effective  coordination 
between  existing  sector-specific  early  warning  and  crisis  cooperation  actors  at  Union  and 
national level, and how did the Fund contribute to the achievement of this progress? 

(iii) What progress was made towards improving the administrative and operational capacity of 
the  Member  States  and  the  Union  to  develop  comprehensive  threat  and  risk  assessments,  and 
how did the Fund contribute to the achievement of this progress? 

70 

 
Efficiency (Were the results of the Fund achieved at reasonable cost?) 

To  what  extent  were  the  expected  results  of  the  Fund  achieved  at  reasonable  cost  in  terms  of 
deployed  financial  and  human  resources?  What  measures  were  put  in  place  to  prevent,  detect, 
report and follow up on cases of fraud and other irregularities, and how did they perform? 

Relevance  (Did  the  objectives  of  the  interventions  funded  by  the  Fund  correspond  to  the 
actual needs?) 

Did  the  objectives  set  by  the  Member  State  in  their  National  Programmes  respond  to  the 
identified needs? Did the objectives set in the Annual Work Programme (Union actions) address 
the actual needs? Did the objectives set in the Annual Work Programme (Emergency assistance) 
address the actual needs? Which measures did the Member State put in place to address changing 
needs? 

Coherence (Were the objectives set in the national programme coherent with the ones set in 
other  programmes  funded  by  EU  resources  and  applying  to  similar  areas  of  work?  Was  the 
coherence ensured also during the implementation of the Fund?) 

Was  an  assessment  of  other  interventions  with  similar  objectives  carried  out  and  taken  into 
account  during the programming stage? Were coordination  mechanisms between the Fund and 
other  interventions  with  similar  objectives  established  for  the  implementing  period?  Were  the 
actions  implemented  through  the  Fund  coherent  with  and  non-contradictory  to  other 
interventions with similar objectives? 

Complementarity (Were the objectives set in the national programme and the corresponding 
implemented  actions  complementary  to  those  set  in  the  framework  of  other  policies  —  in 
particular those pursued by the Member State?) 

Was an assessment of other interventions with complementary objectives carried out and taken 
into account during the programming stage? Were coordination mechanisms between the Fund 
and other interventions with similar objectives established for the implementing period to ensure 
their  complementarity  for  the  implementing  period?  Were  mechanisms  aimed  to  prevent 
overlapping of financial instruments put in place? 

EU added value (Was any added value brought about by the EU support?) 

What are the main types of added value resulting from the support of the Fund (volume, scope, 
role, process)? Would the Member State have carried out the actions required to implement the 
EU policies in the areas supported by the Fund without its financial support? What would be the 
most  likely  consequences  of  an  interruption  of  the  support  provided  by  the  Fund?  To  which 
extent have actions supported by the Fund resulted in a benefit at the Union level? What was the 
added value of the operating support? 

Sustainability  (Are  the  positive  effects  of  the  projects  supported  by  the  Fund  likely  to  last 
when its support will be over?) 

What were the main measures adopted by the Member State to ensure the sustainability of the 
results  of  the  projects  implemented  with  support  of  the  Fund  (both  at  programming  and 
implementation  stage)?  Were  mechanisms  put  in  place  to  ensure  a  sustainability  check  at 
programming and implementation stage? To what extent are the outcomes/benefits of the actions 
sustained by the Fund expected to continue thereafter? What measures were  adopted to  ensure 
the continuity of the activities carried out thanks to the operating support? 

71 

 
Simplification and reduction of administrative burden (Were the management procedures of 
the Fund simplified and the administrative burden reduced for its beneficiaries?) 

Did  the  innovative  procedures  introduced  by  the  Fund  (simplified  cost  option,  multiannual 
programming, national eligibility rules, more comprehensive national programmes allowing for 
flexibility, operating support and Special Transit Scheme for Lithuania) lead to simplification for 
the beneficiaries of the Fund? 

72 

 
 
 
ANNEX 5: COST/BENEFIT ANALYSIS 

The following table analyses the costs incurred by the various actors involved in implementing 
ISF-P, the target group, the beneficiaries, the national administrations and the EU. These costs 
vary  from  the  administrative/indirect  or  compliance  costs  for  the  beneficiaries,  to  the 
administrative costs or technical assistance for the responsible authorities, to the actual financial 
costs for the EU and to the human resources costs for all of the above. The analyses made were 
both qualitative and quantitative (including monetary analyses). 

Table 6: Overview of costs associated with the ISF-P 

Target Group 

 

FTE by participants dedicated to implementation of project activities, such as: time spent in 
training, piloting, testing equipment or capacity building. 

  As regards the quantitative aspects, there is no information provided in national evaluation 

reports on FTE by target group participants. 

Beneficiaries 
Admin 

 

national programmes: in the majority of projects, beneficiaries are state institutions. They 
usually assign one to two FTEs to manage the ISF-P projects and as a rule these employees do 
not get compensated for the time they dedicate to project management. Additional 
administrative and financial requirements on ISF-P projects are carried out by the respective 
units at the beneficiaries’ institutions, thus the Fund is not charged with any administrative 
costs at the beneficiary level. Therefore, personnel administrative costs at the beneficiary 
level are minimal. 

  Union actions: the indirect cost of beneficiaries is set at 7 % of the approved budget for the 
action, but these do not include project management costs (e.g. compensation for project 
coordinators, costs of project management activities, such as kick-off meetings or audits). 
Interviewed project coordinators believe the costs for implementing the actions are 
reasonable (76 %, or 26 respondents out of 34). 

National administrations 
Technical 
assistance 

 

Technical assistance covers national authorities’ administrative costs and is set at 5 % of 
national allocations. Based on national evaluation reports and interviews with responsible 
authorities, in many Member States additional administrative resources are deployed for 
managing the national programmes. The cost of these additional resources is covered by the 
national budget, but no data is available to estimate them. 

  Responsible authorities expressed mixed opinions on the efforts made to simplify and reduce 
administrative burden in the Fund’s management. Based on interviews with responsible 
authorities, the measure with the highest approval is the replacement of annual 
programming with multiannual programming. Two-thirds of respondents viewed national 
eligibility rules and specific top-ups as positive steps, whereas less than a third of responsible 
authorities have used the simplified cost option. Overall, only about half of the interviewed 
responsible authorities stated that the administrative burden of managing the Fund has been 
reduced. 
The committed amount for technical assistance for the entire period of the Fund is EUR 36 
million, or 5 % of all allocations for national programmes. For the 2014-2016 period, EUR 2.7 
million has been absorbed, which is only 7.6 % of the total allocations. 15 Member States had 
not claimed any technical assistance payments by the end of 2016. 

 

  A total of 217 FTEs have been deployed at responsible authorities, delegated authorities and 
audit authorities, (according to national interim evaluation reports; these numbers reflect 
the amount of staff dedicated to both ISF Borders and Visa and ISF-P). For the evaluation 
period, it has been calculated that one FTE has managed 3.6 projects, with an average value 
of EUR 1.3 million. 

HR 

European Union 
Budget 
Commit 

 

The total amount provided in allocations to national programmes is EUR 754 million. Most of 
the allocations to the national programmes are dedicated to preventing and combating 
crime (72.6 %). Risks and crisis management projects are allocated 22.5 %, while technical 
assistance is allocated 4.9 %. Multiannual national programmes for the Fund were developed 

73 

 
 
and approved in the 2014-2015 period. A top-up for PNR and IT systems interoperability was 
added in 2017. 

Paym 

  Under direct management, allocations have been made to Union actions, including open calls 

for proposals, direct awards, procurement and EMAS. 

HR 

 

  Open calls were allocated EUR 28.8 million; direct awards were allocated EUR 9.1 million; 
procurement was allocated EUR 16.6 million; and EMAS was allocated EUR 6.2 million. 
The cost for managing ISF (Borders and Police) is estimated based on the number of FTEs 
(internal and external personnel) involved. According to data provided by DG HOME, the 
calculated average amount of the Fund’s budget managed by an FTE is EUR 3.3 million per 
year for the period 2014 — June 2017. The cost for internal and external personnel deployed 
at EU level represents on average 3.8 % of the Fund’s budget and can be assessed as 
reasonable. 
The estimated number of FTEs involved in ISF (Borders and Police) is 555 as of 2017. The 
total cost for the 2014 — June 2017 period is EUR 68 million. 

 

The following table analyses the benefits gained by the various actors involved in implementing 
ISF-P, the target group, the beneficiaries, the national administrations and the EU. These benefits 
vary from intangible such as knowledge developed or capacity built to tangible such as financial 
support. The analyses made are both qualitative and quantitative (including monetary). 

Table 7: Overview of benefits associated with ISF-P  

Capability  to  combat  crime  —  Strengthening  Member  States  capability  to  (i) combat  cross-border,  serious  and 
organised  crime,  including  terrorism,  and  (ii)  boost  their  mutual  cooperation  in  this  field.  Benefits:  tangible 
(financial support) and intangible (knowledge). 
Target Group 

  Disruptions of criminal groups (data on indicators provided by a small number of Member States): 

▪ seizures of cash were reported by EE (EUR 2.5 million) and FR (EUR 1.6 billion); 
▪ the taking down of websites has been reported only by FR with 1 500 in 2016 and 1 351 in 2017; 
▪ the number of victims identified was reported by FR — 120 in 2017 and DE — 1 559 for the period 2014-
2017; 
▪ the number of people arrested was reported by DE (43), FR (253) and MT (9 144) for the period 2014-
2017125; 
▪ seizures of stolen goods were reported by DE (amounting to over EUR 1 million) and EE (EUR 90 million); 
▪ over four million seizures of drugs were reported by five Member States (BG, EE, ES, FI and MT). 

Beneficiaries 

  Mutual cooperation to investigate and counter cross-border, serious and organised crime through 

transnational networks. 
Investment in IT systems and the acquisition and renewal of equipment (BG, CY, CZ, EE, ES, FI, FR, IE, IT, 
LT, LV, MT, PT, RO, SE and SI) which often aimed to upgrade and increase operational equipment in order 
to underpin Member States capability to prevent and combat serious, cross-border organised crime, in 
particular drug trafficking and terrorism. Acquisitions for strengthening IT systems include technological 
and management systems, network devices, IT solutions, telecommunication interception systems, and 
computers. Other investments were made on technical equipment, such as mobile analysis laboratories, 
forensic tools and narcotics analysers. Also, equipment such as special vehicles, drones and protective 
vests and equipment was purchased. 
104 joint investigation teams and EMPACT operations carried out (of which 88 were carried out by DE). 

 

 

National administrations 

 

Investment in IT systems and the acquisition and renewal of equipment, which aimed to upgrade and 
increase operational equipment in order to underpin Member States capabilities. This investment 
included acquisitions of technological and management systems, network devices, IT solutions, 
telecommunication interception systems, and computers. Other investments were made on technical 

125  These figures are based on the information provided by the Member States in their national interim reports and 

may not reflect the reality as it was not checked back with the responsible authorities by the evaluator.   

74 

 
 
                                                 
 
equipment, such as mobile analysis laboratories, forensic tools and narcotics analysers, special vehicles, 
drones and protective vests. 

European Union 

 
 
 

Establishing mutual trust 
Enhancing security of EU citizens 
Enhancing capabilities in specific crime areas, predominantly in financial and economic crime, cybercrime, 
illicit drug trafficking and terrorist threats, through improving operational infrastructures 

  Cooperation amongst Member State also contributed to enhance capability through the exchange of 
information on cross-border crime, the establishment of transnational networks and projects, and the 
participation of Member States in joint investigation teams and the EMPACT Policy Cycle. 
Exchange of information. Benefits: tangible and intangible (increased knowledge and awareness). 
Target Group 

 

 

Enhancing cooperation and coordination among Member States’ public authorities and European bodies 
and institutions. 
To a lesser extent, enhancing cooperation and coordination among with third countries and international 
organisations. 

  Over 25,000 number of hits and exchange of information in the Prüm framework. 
  No other quantitative information available. 

Beneficiaries 

 

 

 
 

Setting up structures and centralised information systems to enable information exchange to take place 
(DE, EL, FI, FR HR, IT, LV, LT, PT). 
Facilitating the access to operational databases and ensuring interconnectedness of IT systems (BG, IE, 
MT)126. 
Enhancing the exchange of data, especially in order to implement the Prüm Treaty and the PNR Directive. 
Strengthening coordination and cooperation mechanisms between law enforcement authorities with 
Europol (HU, LT). 
Improve firearms control in four Member States (BG, DE, FR, and PL). 

 
  Over 25,000 number of hits and exchange of information in the Prüm framework. 
  No other quantitative information available. 

National administrations 

 
 
 
 
 

Improved effective coordination through: 
Facilitating access to operational databases; 
Strengthening coordination and cooperation of law enforcement authorities with Europol; 
Interconnectedness of IT systems. 
Sharing biometric data through cooperation with Europol (SIENA) and Interpol or among Member States 
public authorities. 

  Cooperation and exchange of information with third countries. 
 
  Over 25 000 hits and exchange of information in the Prüm framework. 

Exchange of information led to improved control over firearms in some Member States. 

European Union 

 

ISF-Police funding has been used by Member States to meet their obligations under the PNR Directive. 
Eight Member States (BE, CZ, EE, ES, FR, LU, PL, SE) have used the Fund to implement feasibility studies, 
develop the PIU127 PNR application, modernise their IT infrastructure and security environments. The 
PNR will enable to process considerably larger volumes of data and will offer a larger community of end 
users a more rapid access to the results provided by PNR processing. 

  Over 25,000 number of hits and exchange of information in the Prüm framework. 

Training. Benefits 

126  The  interconnection  with  Interpol  and  Europol  with  national  police  systems  in  Malta  and  Ireland  allowed  the 
national law enforcement authority to make comparisons against the content of the database with more efficient 
and  simplified  searches.  More  specifically,  Ireland  upgraded  the  information  system  of  the  Garda  National 
Immigration  Bureau  in  2016  to  integrate  it  with  the  Interpol  network  database  (FIND)  to  allow  for  automatic 
real-time  checking  of  shared  data,  such  as  information  coming  from  scanned  passports.  The  exchange  of  data 
had an added benefit of the system also containing the information shared by the UK Warnings Index Control 
Unit. Similarly, Bulgaria aimed to ensure access to the ICAO Public Key Directory system which allows border 
control systems of receiving countries to authenticate ePassports of issuing countries 

127  Passenger Information Unit. 

75 

 
                                                 
Target Group 

 

Enhancing capabilities of their law enforcement institutions, notably by developing and/or carrying out 
training activities. 

  Over 11,000 law enforcement officers trained from around 120,000 target.  
  Approx. 30,000 persons days of training carried out. 
 

The highest number was achieved in Germany – 4,003 followed by Slovenia (1,911), Romania (1,474) and 
France (1,261) 

  Under Union Action, approx. 300 enforcement officials were trained and 720 training units (person-days) 

were organised. 

Beneficiaries 

Train-the-trainer actions expected to have a multiplier effect. 

 
  Over 11,000 law enforcement officers trained from around 120,000 target.  
  Approx. 30,000 persons days of training carried out. 
 

The highest number was achieved in Germany – 4,003 followed by Slovenia (1,911), Romania (1,474) and 
France (1,261). 

National administrations 

 

Improved law enforcement capabilities and strengthened human resources, especially through financing 
training and hiring additional staff. 

  Over 11 000 law enforcement officers trained. 
  Approx. 30 000 people days of training carried out. 

European Union 

 

Enhancing capabilities of law enforcement agencies through training and acquisition of new skills and 
knowledge. 

  Over 11,000 law enforcement officers trained from around 120,000 target.  
  Approx. 30,000 persons days of training carried out  
 

The highest number was achieved in Germany – 4,003 followed by Slovenia (1,911), Romania (1,474) and 
France (1,261) 
Protection of victims. Benefits 
Target Group 

  Awareness raised on and providing information to crime victims, human trafficking and sex worker 

trafficking (AT, EE, ES, MT, RO and SE). 

  Victims and witness protection programmes (AT, CZ, FI and MT). 
 

Support for victims of crime and witnesses in courts (e.g. court ruling via video conferencing facilities to 
avoid secondary victimisation, as well as interview rooms) (CZ and FI). 

  Close to one million crime victims have been protected or assisted under ISF-P actions in only five 

Member States. 

Beneficiaries 

  Awareness-raising on and providing information to crime victims. 
  Close to 1 million crime victims have been protected or assisted under ISF-Police actions in only 5 

Member States. 
National administrations 

Law enforcement training on crime victim support (NL, MT and RO). 

 
  Close to 1 million crime victims have been protected or assisted under ISF-Police actions in only 5 

Member States. 

Capability to protect critical infrastructure 
Target Group 

  Reinforcing Member States' administrative and operational capability to protect critical infrastructure in 

 

 

the sectors of economic activity. 
192 tools used by Member States ( data provided by BE, CY, EE, EL, LV, MT and SI) to  put in place and/or 
further upgraded with the help of the Fund to facilitate the protection of critical infrastructure. 
134 expert meetings, workshops, seminars, conferences, publications, websites and online consultations 
organised with the help of the Fund related to critical infrastructure. 

Beneficiaries 

 

Improving cooperation between relevant public and private, national and international stakeholders, 
operators of critical infrastructure in the case of terrorist or CRBNE attacks, including training of law 
enforcement officials (AT, CY, EE, EL, ES, FI, FR, HU, NL, MT, RO, SE). For example: 

(1)  In Romania, the Centre for Coordinating the Protection of Critical Infrastructure has trained 100 

76 

 
liaison officers as part of its aim to establish a national training platform concerning the security 
of the 10 sectors of critical infrastructure;  

(2)  In Austria, structures, processes and measures were further developed to improve the protection 

of critical infrastructure, including the improvement and implementation of the Austrian 
Programme for the Protection of Critical Infrastructure (APCIP). This project resulted in a series 
of awareness raising meetings with operators of critical infrastructure, including discussions on 
specific thematic areas (e.g. extremism, terrorism, protection of property, ICT, etc.) and 
engagement with private sector operators. Operators of critical infrastructure companies will be 
incorporated in the risk and crisis management and into early warning systems. Before the 
support of ISF Police, only the safety authorities and the police were informed of current threats. 

 

  Acquiring protective and preventive equipment for police forces or special rescue units, mainly specialised 
equipment to strengthen CBRNE defence, including protective clothing, bomb robots, special vehicles (BE, 
CY, EE, FR, HU, LV); purchase of substance analysers (CZ, EE, FI). 
192 tools used by Member States ( data provided by BE, CY, EE, EL, LV, MT and SI) to  put in place and/or 
further upgraded with the help of the Fund to facilitate the protection of critical infrastructure  
134 expert meetings, workshops, seminars, conferences, publications, websites and online consultations 
organised with the help of the Fund related to critical infrastructure 

 

National administrations 

 

 

Information systems (purchased ICT devices) for the crisis management centre (SI)128 or the rescue board 
(EE). 
 
Emergency response communication strategies involving the public in case of an attack (DE and MT); 
  New security concepts in case of one-off (international high-level meeting in BE) or larger-scale incidents 
affecting critical infrastructure (e.g. breakdown of electricity network in SE plus another large-scale 
incident in NL); increasing security at airports through improving the security system by purchasing new 
equipment and technologies (CZ) or through training (FR). 
Event management centre for cooperation and exchange of knowledge in order to protect critical 
infrastructure (HU). 
Increased cybersecurity, such as raising public awareness (NL), a command and control centre to increase 
knowledge, and improve international cooperation (PT). 
The protection of critical infrastructure has been facilitated by the Fund as 192 tools have been used by 
Member States (data provided by BE, CY, EE, EL, LV, MT and SI) to put in place and further upgrade critical 
infrastructure. 
134 expert meetings, workshops, seminars, conferences, publications, websites and online consultations 
organised in relation to critical infrastructure with the Fund’s help. 

 

 

 

128  Slovenia upgraded the ICT equipment of the National Centre for Crisis Management and established a uniform 

IP Protected Communication Network. The new equipment is being used for crisis management exercises. 

77 

 
 
 
 
                                                 
ANNEX  6:  EXAMPLES  OF  PROJECTS  USED  TO  ANSWER  THE 
EVALUATION QUESTIONS 

Member States strengthening international and cross-border cooperation 

FI:  ISF-P  has  financed  IT-developments  to  be  commonly  used  by  law  enforcement  authorities  to  improve  the 
analytical  capability  to  investigate  economic  crime,  which  is  also  relevant  for  tackling  transnational  criminal 
phenomena.  This  has  contributed  to  the  increased  detection  of  crimes  and  to  shortening  the  investigation  time. 
Large-scale  crime  analysis  with  large  amounts  of  data  can  now  be  carried  out,  which  previously  had  not  been 
possible. 

DE: The Federal Criminal Police Office is carrying out projects that: (i) combat organised property crime in DE, BG 
and  RO;  (ii)  gather  information  on  the  exploitation  of  minors  by  criminal  organisations  in  DE,  BG,  RO;  and  (iii) 
exchange research results as part of the Research Network on Organised Crime. 

PT, ES, UK, IE, FR, NL and IT jointly-cooperate in fighting illicit drug trafficking by air and sea in the project 
‘Maritime Analysis and Operations Centre — Narcotics (MAOC-N)’. Over recent years, the Centre’s data gathering 
and intelligence sharing activities have proven key to the seizure of large quantities of drugs (in particular cocaine) 
en route to the EU. 

Europol: The project ‘Secondary Security Checks at Hotspots including training and deployment of guest officers 
and own staff for monitoring and guiding purposes’, aimed to  strengthen the security of the EU’s external border, 
against,  among  other  things,  counter-terrorism,  migrant  smuggling,  and  THB,  in  particular  through  providing 
secondary security checks. 

Threat and risk assessments projects 

AT  has  set  up  an  operational  unit  within  the  Federal  Office  for  the  Protection  of  the  Constitution  and  Counter-
Terrorism dealing with threat and risk assessments, therefore creating the structural precondition for institutionalised 
threat and risk assessments at national level. The Office has already provided training for risk managers to develop 
their expertise in assessments. 

EE participated in CBRN cooperation projects and training, and carries out two different projects under the national 
objective related to the Estonian Rescue Board: (i) one aiming to develop a new IT system that saves and analyses 
data for specific threat and risk assessments, and (ii) another aiming to improve the capacity of data analysis and the 
capability to collect, store and handle information related to explosives. 

Union  actions:  The  programmes  ‘Shielding  South-east  Europe  from  CBRN-E  threats’  and  ‘Coordinated 
transnational  training  programme  for  prevention  and  mitigation  of  CBR  release  induced  by  non-state  actors’  both 
aim to improve the capability of law enforcement in understanding, detecting and mitigating CBRN-E risks through 
training.  

The  objective  of  the  Union  actions  ‘Minimising  insider  threats  within  the  supply  chain  of  the  precursors  for 
explosives’ is to develop ‘smart measures’ to reduce insider threat when precursors are being produced, distributed, 
sold and used.  

The  action  ‘Enhancing  Beneficial  Ownership  Transparency’  conducted  comparative  studies  of  different  national 
experiences to develop risk assessment methodologies on high-risk areas of terrorism financing. 

Projects aiming to improve operational coordination and cooperation by sharing biometric 
data 

AT and SK have undertaken actions to link their national Automated Finger Identification Systems to the VIS and 
EURODAC. 

12  Member  States  (BE,  BG,  DE,  ES,  FI,  FR,  IE,  LT,  LU,  LV,  SI  and  SK)  have  taken  measures  to  create  an 
effective  system  for  exchanging  data  on  DNA  and  fingerprints,  including  steps  towards  accrediting  forensic 
laboratories, and vehicle registration data of concerned persons, in line with the Prüm decisions. Training has been 
carried  out,  the  equipment  has  already  been  used  in  more  than  68 000  operations,  and  eight  forensic  laboratories 

78 

 
have been accredited. 

Union actions: ‘DNA‐STR Massive Sequencing & International Information Exchange’ is developing a new, more 
efficient and effective DNA profiling methodology for forensic laboratories worldwide involved in generating DNA 
profiles for upload and searching in National DNA databases.  

The ‘European Strategic Communications Network’ is building on the work of the Syria Strategic Communication 
Advisory  Team  project  to  intensify  the  exchange  of  expertise  in  the  field  of  strategic  communications  to  counter 
violent extremism and terrorism. 

Projects on crisis cooperation 

Union actions: The project ‘Detection and response to the radicalisation appearances’ is being coordinated by the 
Estonian Police and Border Guard with public authority counterparts from LV, FI and LT. Its objective is to train 
police officers in dealing with cases of radicalisation and hence improve preparedness in crisis situations. 

The project ‘Illicit Trafficking Radiation Assessment Program phase II -Round Robin Tests (ITRAP+10, phase II –
RRT)’  coordinated  by  French  Agency  of  International  Technical  Expertise  helped  Member  States’  national 
laboratories to build up testing capabilities of nuclear security instruments. These instruments are able to detect and 
identify  the  presence  and  movement  of  radioactive  materials,  for  instance,  at  border  crossings  whether  they  are 
imports, exports, or shipments in transit. 

Projects on capability to protect critical infrastructure 

EE  has  been  especially  active  in  the  field  of  protecting  critical  infrastructure,  in  particular  concerning  issues 
surrounding CBRN-E and IT systems. 

FR  acquired  new  decontamination  mobile  units  to  strengthen  the  capacities  of  decontamination  and  critical 
infrastructure across the territory should there be a CBRN-E attack. More than 2 600 people were trained to use these 
units. 12 units and 600 individual outfits were purchased. 

AT  further  developed  structures,  processes  and  measures  to  improve  the  protection  of  critical  infrastructure, 
including improving and implementing the Austrian programme for the protection of critical infrastructure (APCIP). 

Union  actions:  The  project  ‘FTE-project:  Studying  the  Acquisition  of  illicit  Firearms  by  Terrorists  in  Europe’ 
implemented  by  the  Vlaas  Vredesinstituut  in  BE  with  IT  and  SE  partners,  aims  to  develop  ‘cybercrime  expert’ 
training to prevent an increase in the number of cyberattacks on IT systems, including critical systems.  

The  project  ‘Shielding  South-east  Europe  from  CBRN-E  threats’,  coordinated  by  the  Greek  Centre  for  Security 
Studies with partners from EL and CY, aims to raise awareness of critical infrastructure threats in the area of CBRN-
E  among  first  line  practitioners  (police  officers,  coast  guards,  customs  officers  etc.).  This  mainly  deals  with  the 
preventive level of CBRN-E risks which have cross-border and cross-sector components. 

The project ‘CBRN-E Law Enforcement Training Initiative — CELECTIVE’ — coordinated by European CBRNE 
Centre of Umeå University, with partners from CZ, NL and SE — aims to protect critical infrastructure from CBRN-
E threats by establishing a consolidated training programme that highlights cross-border cooperation. 

Projects on identifying and supporting witnesses and victims of crime and terrorism 

MT  launched  a  victim  support  unit  in  April  2017.  Its  aim  is  to  provide  victims  of  crime  with  access  to  support 
services  and  increase  their  participation  in  protection  programmes.  Also,  an  awareness-raising  campaign  targeted 
law enforcement officials to make them better aware of the adopted standard procedures when working with victims 
of crime. 

SE: the Crime Victim Compensation and Support Authority is developing an interactive website to make relevant 
information to victims easily accessible and comprehensible. 

FI: the justice administration’s IT systems  that deal with compensating crime victims  were renewed. The systems 
are in place and payments can be coordinated towards supporting crime victims. 

79 

 
Union  actions:  The  project  ‘Psychological  health  impact  of  THB  for  sexual  exploitation  on  female  victims. 
Consequences  for  stakeholders’  aims  to  improve  and  optimise  the  treatment  of  female  trafficking  victims  who 
suffered sexual exploitation by taking into account the impact THB had on their psychological health.  

One  of  the  main  objectives  of  the  project  ‘Countering  THB,  Protecting  Victims  and  Enhancing  Financial 
Investigations’  is  protecting  and  assisting  victims  through  strengthening  mutual  trust  and  networking  between 
experts and contributing to the discussion and analysis on measuring the costs of victims assistance. 

Projects on training and train-the-trainer 

Training on the protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms, especially victim support (CY, CZ, HU and 
NL). In addition, two Member States (AT and ES) used ISF-P to carry out training for cooperation partners in third 
countries on human trafficking and other crime-related topics.  

Training on THB (AT, ES, HU and SI). 

Training on cybercrime (AT, CY, CZ, EE, FI, FR and SI) and online child abuse (SI). FI is currently developing a 
study programme on preventing cybercrime and on cyber competence for the Police University College. 

Training  on  corruption  (CY,  CZ,  LT,  PT,  RO  and  SI),  asset  recovery  (ES  and  HU),  economic  crime  and  money 
laundering (EL, FR, HU, PT and SI).  

Training on new methods and techniques for countering drug trafficking (CY, CZ, EE and ES). 

Union actions: The project ‘Bounce resilience training, network and evaluation — STRESAVIORAII’ is developing 
a  resilience  train-the-trainer  programme  for  trainers  working  with  young  people,  parents  and  frontline  workers  to 
prevent radicalisation and create a network of trainers to enable the exchange of best practice and knowledge. So far 
10 cities in 5 Member States have been identified (BE, DE, FR, NL and SE) for pilot trainings. 

The  project  ‘Turning  —  Detection  of  drugs  trafficking  &  drugs  production:  Train  the  trainers  course,  course 
curriculum, toolkit & exchange of best practices’ aims to develop, among other things, an effective coordination of 
training  on  law  enforcement  information  exchange  for  single  point  of  contact  (SPOC)  staff  and  relevant  SPOC 
‘stakeholders’.  This  is  to  be  pursued  through  improved  cooperation  with  CEPOL  which  will  benefit  from  project 
results through a clearer, updated, training needs analysis. 

Potential complementarity or overlapping with ISF-P 

Both the justice programme and Fiscalis 2020 fund activities that could potentially fall under the broader scope of 
ISF-P. However, in both cases there is no risk of duplication due to the different nature of the projects’ beneficiaries. 
In  this  sense,  actions  undertaken  under  the  justice  programme  target  judiciary  and  judicial  staff,  a  group  of 
practitioners  that  can  only  ultimately  benefit  from  measures  under  ISF-P  insofar  as  these  aim  to  encourage 
cooperation  between  judicial  and  law  enforcement  authorities.  Similarly,  Fiscalis  2020  targets  national  tax 
authorities as opposed to police services.  

Potential  for  complementarity  is  also  identified  with  regard  to  the  structural  reform  support  programme 
(SRSP),  whose  thematic  scope  partially  overlaps  with  ISF-P  concerning  the  fight  against  corruption,  fraud  and 
money laundering. Nonetheless, the nature of the support provided to Member States under each programme differs. 
In this sense, while ISF-P provides financial support for implementing specific projects, the SRSP aims to provide 
hand-on technical support for the design, planning and implementation of anti-corruption, anti-fraud and anti-money 
laundering strategies. Thus, ISF-P and the SRSP are complementary.  

Potential for overlap has been found with Horizon 2020 as regards analysis and evaluation activities. However, the 
research activities carried out under ISF-P are primarily related to implementing measures, while the focus of H2020 
research focus on developing innovative technologies and solutions. This is also reflected in the nature of potential 
beneficiaries  of  H2020  calls,  constituted  by  researchers,  universities,  companies  and  institutes  from  within  and 
outside of the EU. In any case, as they are aware of the potential overlap, most countries have indicated that they pay 
particular attention to potential inconsistencies between actions funded by ISF-P and those by H2020 (e.g. AT, CZ 
and EE).  

The  Instrument for  Pre-Accession Assistance (IPA  II)  and  the  European  Neighbourhood Instrument  provide 
support  in  the  fight  against  corruption  and  the  strengthening  of  institutional  capacity  by  means  of  coordination, 

80 

 
cooperation, networking and training activities, which points to potential overlap between these instruments and ISF-
P.  However,  their  geographical  scope  is  different  to  that  of  ISF-P,  and  the  share  of  the  budget  destined  to  these 
actions  under  the  national  programmes  and  Union  actions  is  relatively  limited.  Therefore,  the  complementarity 
between these programmes can be assessed as high. 

81