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Opinion 288 (2015)
Budget and priorities of the Council of Europe for the biennium 2016-2017
1. Europe is experiencing a period
of political and economic tension, characterised by the consequences of
the economic and financial crises of 2008, consolidation in the
public finances of many member States and serious violations of
the rule of law and human rights. These phenomena undermine democratic
stability and contribute to the emergence of political extremism,
racism and intolerance. The Parliamentary Assembly is convinced
that the Council of Europe has the recognised authority and expertise,
as well as the appropriate mechanisms, to be an indispensable partner
in European co-operation aimed at confronting these challenges and
assisting the member States to find effective solutions to the present
problems.
2. The member States trust the Council of Europe to provide a
coherent response to these crises. However, in exchange for their
financing, they expect the Organisation to offer real added value
as compared with its cost, in other words to be effective and efficient.
3. The Assembly notes that, during his first term of office,
the Secretary General of the Council of Europe, Mr Thorbjørn Jagland,
implemented a series of measures intended to enhance the effectiveness
of the Organisation while reducing its costs, in particular its
wage bill, which led to a saving of €15 million over the period
under consideration.
4. The Assembly also welcomes the Secretary General’s efforts
to reinforce the Organisation’s capacity to raise extrabudgetary
resources (voluntary contributions by member and non-member States
and by the European Union, signature of joint programmes with the
European Union and other sources of funds) so as to make the Council
of Europe even more operational. In this context, the Assembly underlines
the importance of its co-operation programmes that are financed
with this type of resources and which focus on the problems identified
in the various reports it has adopted.
5. The Assembly nonetheless considers that the temporary nature
of these additional resources and their increasing share in the
overall budget of the Council of Europe may, in the medium term,
jeopardise the Organisation’s financial equilibrium and the planning
of its activities. This is because such resources cannot be used
to offset the costs inherent in their management or to cover financing
needs in respect of traditional activities or essential expenditure
on investments in the upkeep, modernisation and preservation of
the value of the Organisation’s assets (in particular for building
maintenance and information technology needs).
6. In view of the challenges Europe faces from violence and conflicts,
and the resulting democratic instability, the Assembly considers
that the Council of Europe should have greater means to fulfil its
role and is concerned about the repercussions, in the medium and
the long term, of the Committee of Ministers’ decision to continue
to apply the principle of zero nominal growth to member States’
contributions to the upcoming budget for the biennium 2016-2017.
7. The Assembly would like the Committee of Ministers to adopt
flexible budgetary measures, as suggested in its previous opinions
on the budgets and priorities of the Council of Europe, namely the
ability to carry forward unspent appropriations without restriction
from one year to the next within a biennial budget and the creation, in
the Council of Europe’s accounts, of a reserve account to be used
to cover investment expenditure, fed with the full amount, or a
percentage to be determined, of any unspent balance at the end of
a biennial budget period. Such a flexible approach to budget planning
would enhance the effectiveness of the Council of Europe’s activities
and help make them better suited to the changing situations of beneficiary
countries.
8. The Assembly welcomes the Turkish Government’s proposal to
become a major contributor to the budgets of the Council of Europe
with effect from 1 January 2016 and thanks this country’s government
and parliament for their support in strengthening the Organisation’s
capacity to fulfil its role.
9. The Assembly has taken note of the motion for a recommendation
tabled by several members concerning the allocation of seats in
the Parliamentary Assembly in respect of Turkey. This proposal aims
to remedy the consequences of this country’s under-representation
(in terms of its population, Turkey ranks third among the Council
of Europe member States) by setting the number of seats to which
Turkey is entitled at 18 and by including Turkish among the Assembly’s
working languages.
10. The Assembly calls on the Committee of Ministers to accept
the Turkish Government’s proposal, without, however, reducing the
amounts of the other member States’ contributions to the Organisation’s
budgets.
11. Regarding the priorities for 2016 and 2017, the Assembly takes
note of the Secretary General’s strategic choices concerning the
following priority fields:
11.1. strengthening
the European Court of Human Rights and the principle of shared responsibility
with the various Council of Europe bodies active in this field (institutional
organs such as the Parliamentary Assembly, the Congress of Local
and Regional Authorities, the Commissioner for Human Rights and other
standard-setting mechanisms of the Council of Europe);
11.2. reinforcing co-operation with the member States;
11.3. upholding democratic principles;
11.4. enhancing assistance to neighbouring countries;
11.5. strengthening the European Social Charter (revised) (ETS
No. 163);
11.6. strengthening cohesion between the Secretary General and
the statutory organs, in particular the Parliamentary Assembly;
11.7. increasing the Council of Europe’s operational capacity.
12. Following the terrorist attacks perpetrated in Paris, in Copenhagen
and recently in Tunis, the Assembly gives its support to the Secretary
General’s initiatives for combating terrorism, radicalisation and
extremism by making the best possible use of all the legal instruments
of the Council of Europe and proposing new instruments.
13. The Assembly is firmly convinced that the Council of Europe’s
strategy for fighting terrorism should be long term and that it
needs to encompass not just legal instruments, but also other activities
of the Organisation, namely democratic governance, including the
various aspects of elections, the fight against corruption, education,
teaching, culture and inter-faith dialogue.
14. The Assembly points out that it has acted at its own level
by establishing the No Hate Parliamentary Alliance, a network of
parliamentarians whose aim is to campaign against racism, hatred
and intolerance in co-operation with their national parliaments,
at the national and European levels, and a parliamentary anti-corruption
platform.
15. The Assembly considers that the Council of Europe should increase
its role in addressing, at pan-European level, the challenges to
human rights and social cohesion linked to migration flows, including refugees
and asylum seekers and migrants in an irregular situation. The Assembly
regrets that there is no specific intergovernmental committee in
the Organisation to deal with these issues. The establishment of
such a body would allow for enhanced and co-ordinated action, and
greater efficiency in this respect.
16. The Assembly considers that all these activities must go hand
in hand with the creation of a coherent, Europe-wide system of human
rights protection and reinforced co-operation with member States
in combating terrorism, while ensuring that States do not adopt
measures which conflict with the principles and case law arising
from the application of the European Convention on Human Rights
(ETS No. 5). In this context, the Assembly wishes to underline the
legislative role that its members must play as elected representatives
sitting in the national parliaments of the member States.
17. With regard to the effectiveness of the European Convention
on Human Rights and the follow-up given to the Brighton Declaration
of 2012, the Assembly recalls the importance of giving the Council
of Europe the financial means to fulfil its obligations without
undermining its other activities and programmes, as the Assembly
already proposed in its Resolution
1856 (2012) on guaranteeing the authority and effectiveness
of the European Convention on Human Rights and in particular its Recommendation 1812 (2007) on
the political dimension of the Council of Europe budget, where it
suggested that minimum scales be set for member States’ contributions
so as to cover at least the administrative cost of a judge at the
European Court of Human Rights.
18. In order to enable journalists from all member States, in
particular States under a monitoring procedure or engaged in post-monitoring
dialogue with the Assembly, to freely and independently cover Council
of Europe activities, the Assembly invites the Secretary General
of the Council of Europe to reintroduce the funding of invitations
for journalists to attend major events organised by the Organisation,
including the part-sessions of the Assembly.