TENs conciliation talks fail to bring agreement

Date: 30/05/1996

CONTINUED failure to reach a compromise has forced member states and MEPs to extend the conciliation period for agreement on the guidelines for the Trans-European Networks by two weeks.

The only concrete result to come out of this week's conciliation meeting was an agreement to set 12 June as the date for the next - and possibly last - meeting. The final deadline for a deal is 19 June.

German Socialist MEP Willy Piecyk said afterwards that little progress had been made on the two outstanding problem areas - the Parliament's demand that an environmental article and a third annex detailing an extensive list of priority projects should be written into the TENs guidelines.

Piecyk laid the blame for the continued impasse firmly at the door of the Council, insisting: “Transport ministers must take up their political responsibilities, or, if the TENs fail to come to fruition, national parliaments will ask how this was allowed to happen.”

But member state officials said that, for the second time, the Council had come forward with a compromise only to see the Parliament reject it out of hand.

Since the beginning of the dispute, MEPs have demanded that all the projects originally listed by the Christophersen Group as potential candidates for TENs money should be formally written into the guidelines, claiming that projects could only be clearly identified as candidates for funding if they were set out explicitly in the regulations.

However, member states argue that the existing guidelines, which include maps and general criteria but no specific projects, are sufficient. They maintain that the decision not to enshrine the chosen projects in a legal text means that MEPs have no formal say over the share-out of TENs money.

The Council has suggested attaching a political declaration to the guidelines, accepting MEPs' involvement in the process but falling short of granting Parliament co-decision powers over all aspects of the TENs.

But a member state official claimed the Parliament “simply tore up this idea”.

Member state negotiators are particularly annoyed at the impression being given by the Parliament that the Council has been inflexible. “We have offered to move at both formal conciliation sessions,” said one.

Council officials have been encouraged by support from Transport Commissioner Neil Kinnock, who has stressed the Commission's view that the list of priority projects is supposed to be indicative and there is no need to define them precisely in the text.

Less time was devoted to the dispute over how to assess the environmental impact of the TENs projects. Although pessimistic, Piecyk said that at least the Council had agreed to look at the MEPs' demands for an environmental article to be written into the guidelines.

Member states insist that environmental rules should be defined under existing parts of the treaty, rather than adding another layer of bureaucracy by writing new environmental guidelines into the TENs.

“It's a bit of a contradiction that the Parliament wants to impose a timetable on the member states, but it's also looking to force us into further environmental undertakings which could hold the projects up indefinitely,” said another official.

Piecyk is by no means optimistic that a solution can be found by the deadline, although member state officials are taking a more positive stance.

Failure to agree by 19 June would block EU financing of 280 million ecu this year and 1.278 billion set aside for future years, plus any additional financing the Commission might persuade governments to move from other areas of the EU budget.