C 498/48
EN
Official Journal of the European Union
30.12.2022
Towards a new strategic framework for the European Structural and Investment Funds ...
35. notes a certain trend towards the multiplication of investment funds at European level, some of which are under direct management, shared management (such as the European Structural and Investment Funds — ESIF) or with the State in a leading role in their implementation (the national recovery and resilience plans supported by the RRF);
36. is concerned by the current trend to increase the transfer of ESIF funds to other policies or programmes, such as national recovery and resilience plans or directly managed programmes such as Horizon Europe; as such, strongly opposes the transfer of funds from cohesion policy and the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD) to the RRF; it is the RRF, based on Article 175 TFEU, that aims to complement the efforts of cohesion policy to achieve the objectives of Article 174 TFEU, and not the other way around; furthermore, points out that cohesion policy already represents a major contribution to European green investments and to the EU’s energy independence; therefore concludes that the recentralisation of EU funds via the transfer of the aforementioned funds to the RRF is not justified;
37. notes that this trend has a twofold adverse effect, contributing, on the one hand, to reducing the effectiveness of cohesion policy as a long-term development policy and, on the other, to downgrading it to a simple budget line in the European Union’s multiannual financial framework;
38. therefore calls on the European Commission to develop a new strategic framework for the post-2027 period focusing on partnership and multilevel governance and making general provision for all EU investment funds with a territorial dimension, i.e. the ESIF, the possible future Social Climate Fund, the EAFRD and the future RRF where appropriate;
39.
stresses in particular the need to reintegrate the EAFRD into this new strategic framework;
40. calls also for special attention to be paid to the future of the European Social Fund (ESF) in order to incorporate a stronger territorial dimension and to enhance the role of local and regional authorities in its implementation;
... aimed at genuine simplification in the implementation of the ESIF...
41. notes that the legislative framework for cohesion policy covering the period 2021-2027 contains significant simplification measures, such as the extension of simplified cost options, which will have to be assessed once implemented under the 2021-2027 programming;
42. points out, however, that the proliferation of funds and of rules, deadlines and arrangements for the implementation of funds under shared management has recently led to an increased administrative burden for the managing authorities of the funds, which are often at regional level;
43. notes that this administrative burden leads to delays in the implementation of ESIF funds for which regions are often considered responsible, which undermines the image of cohesion policy as an effective investment policy in the eyes of European citizens;
44. emphasises the crucial role of regions in breaking up silos in the implementation of ESIF funds and linking them to a place-based approach in order to support place-based development strategies;
45. already calls on the Commission to start a long-term reflection process involving ESIF managing authorities at regional level in order to simplify management, control and audit rules, leading to a genuine reform with a view to the next cohesion policy legislative package for the post-2027 period;
46. reiterates the request of the European Committee of the Regions to implement a contract of trust between the European Commission and the managing authorities for cohesion policy to make the ESIF funds attractive for project developers once more and so that programmes with a very low residual error rate in the 2021-2027 programming period can benefit from simplified management, control and audit rules for the next programming period;