On 1 October 2014, Corina CREŢU, Member designate of the EC in charge of Regional Policy, was heard by the Committee on Regional Development to test her general competences, European commitment and specific expertise related to her portfolio. Corina CREŢU had the opportunity to make an opening statement, took part in a question and answer session and made a closing statement. Although the Parliament can only vote on the Commission as a whole, a negative assessment of one of the candidates has in the past already led to the candidacy being withdrawn and replaced.

Brussels

exchange of views

hearing

CREȚU, Corina (S&D, RO)

COZZOLINO, Andrea (NI, IT)

D'AMATO, Rosa (Greens/EFA, IT)

OMARJEE, Younous (The Left, FR)

Committee on Regional Development

van NISTELROOIJ, Lambert (EPP, NL)

PORĘBA, Tomasz Piotr (ECR, PL)

hearing of Corina CREŢU (T)

Hearing of Corina CREŢU (Romania), Commissioner-designate for Regional Policy: MEPs questions & answers

https://api.multimedia.europarl.europa.eu/documents/20125/12178083/I093045Chapters%5BSD-EN%5D.srt

SOUNDBITE (English), Lambert van NISTELROOIJ (EPP, NL), The gap between investments and payments, commitments and payments is growing and growing, at least to liquidity related difficulties for realised projects, for beneficiaries all over the Union. The amount accumulated at the end of last year was 23.4 billion in cohesion and in this very moment might have already been rising. How does the Commissioner designate - and by extension the whole EC - remedy this problem ?

SOUNDBITE (English), Corina CRE&#354;U, Commissioner-designate for Regional Policy, I think it is essential to slowdown this snow ball effect for unpaid bills, and of course we have to find, on the urgent basis, some solution to avoid systematic delays in payment to beneficiary and the implementation of the programmes. This is not a problem concerning only regional resources, but the full budget. That's creating a lot of problems of the ground. I can't understand, to be honest, how we can ask the member states to pay within the deadline of 60 or 90 days and we don't pay our own commitments. This is something very important that we have to rise in the College of Commissioners.

SOUNDBITE (Italian), Andrea COZZOLINO (S&amp;D, IT), Can the Commission intervene in the next few months in order to make a goal of simplification and governance, and to simply remind the member states that they need to pay more attention to cities as the new protagonists of the new cohesion policy in the next years.

SOUNDBITE (Romanian), Corina CRE&#354;U, There are rules which must be simplified in the member states. There are programmes in some member states which need more than 40 signatures to obtain an investment agreement. This is not an EU legislative constraint. So from this point of view I consider that we have to find an optimum equilibrium between the simplification and the control within the EU budget, and as I've said earlier, we can't compromise with regularity; we got to be sure on the strict applications of the expensive rules.

SOUNDBITE (English), Tomasz Piotr POR&#280;BA (ECR, pl ), Do you think that Carpathian require a separate file in the EU programmes, and are you going to promote this idea as a new Commissioner?

SOUNDBITE (Romanian), Corina CRE&#354;U, I'm sure you are familiar with the principles of macro regions, primarily has to be best initiative of member states. I personally believe that the macro regions are useful because they put together the energy of member states facing the same challenges. The idea is to engage in dialogue and cooperation, on the bases of clear political will. As you are aware there are funding limits at the moment, and for micro regions member states need to take the initiative, within the actual limits of the legislation.

SOUNDBITE (French), Younous OMARJEE (GUE/NGL, FR), You know that certain member states are awaiting the discussion of the CFP, in order to make some cuts in the budget, with the real risk to see that the regional spending is going to be affected.

SOUNDBITE (Romanian), Corina CRE&#354;U, We can't put in to question the existing founds, or any revision of the multiannual financial framework, which has already been debated and agreed on the co-decision arrangements between the EP and other institutions, in particular the Council, and it is important to remain strict within the actual legislatives rules. . But we should join to effort to avoid any threat of cuts.

SOUNDBITE (Italian), Rosa D&apos;AMATO (EFDD, IT), In your mission letter is stipulated that the Commission will insure all the synergies for using our funds to insure a good global governance system. The fact is that in the member states there are regions facing regional, social, territorial challenges. A top down approach raise the question on the problems on the multitude governance. Can the commission insure maximum synergy between our found and the system of governance so that we can make sure that the regions do not pay the price for the economic national problems?

SOUNDBITE (Romanian), Corina CRE&#354;U, We are there to provide assistance to whole regions, and the conditions for macro conditionality have also been adopted by the Parliament and by the Council . We have learned the lessons from what happened during the economic crisis, certainly there are criteria which must be at the basis of solid investments, otherwise that simply opens the door to waist of public money.

SOUNDBITE (German), Martina MICHELS (GUE/NGL, DE), How are you are going to stop member states rescheduling or reprogramming at national levels and leaving aside the interests of the regions? How you are going to insure that regional and local levels are fully involved on the further development of the EU policies in the next 7 years? Or are you just going to leave this to the member states?

SOUNDBITE (Romanian), Corina CRE&#354;U, I certainly share your views . The population at large should not be punished by their governments or decision makers taking the wrong decisions or being in any way negligent. . Certainly the EC is not going to cut off funding overnight. It will take time, it will be a period of months, or even years, the member states will be requested to comply. So at the end of the day we also provide funding for structural funds, so there for that fits in the cohesion policy. The idea is to help member states focus on the structural reforms they need to implement.