Vol. 500 No. 2
151 Mr. Gregory asked the Minister for Finance the structures, if any, that will be put in place in the context of the regionalisation of the country for the purpose of receipt of EU Stuctural Funds; and the process of consultation which this involves. [3759/99]
As announced yesterday, the Government has decided to establish two new group regional authorities whose functional areas will correspond to the two NUTS II regions which the Government has proposed to EUROSTAT. The new group regional authorities will be based on the existing regional authority structure. They will be called the Border, Midlands and Western Group Regional Authority and the Southern and Eastern Group Regional Authority. They will cover respectively (a) the current regional authority areas of the Border, midlands and west, to include Counties Clare and Kerry, and (b) the regional authority areas of Dublin, the mid-east, the mid-west, excluding Clare, south-west, which with the exclusion of Kerry will be known as the Cork region, and the south-east.
The two new group regional authorities will have the following responsibilities: promoting co-ordination of the provision of public services in their areas; advising the Government on the regional dimension of the National Development Plan (NDP); monitoring the general impact of all EU programmes of assistance under the community support framework, CSF, in their areas, and managing regional programmes in the next CSF.
While the Government will retain the final decision on the content of the NDP, the two regional authorities will have a major consultative role in this regard. The existing regional authorities which comprise the new group regions have already been given financial assistance to enable them to produce regional strategies for the new NUTS II regions for input into the NDP.
The assignment to the new group regional authorities of responsibility for managing regional programmes in the next CSF represents a significant devolution of responsibility to regional authorities by providing for the first time for regional programmes in the National Development Plan and for regional authority management of such programmes. Management of the regional programmes means that the new group regional authorities will be involved in drafting the regional programme for their area in conjunction with the Department of Finance. They will also chair the regional programme monitoring committee and act as secretariat to the committee.
The membership of the new group regional authorities will be drawn from elected representatives from the eight existing regional authorities. The existing regional authorities will remain in existence and will retain their existing functions at sub-regional or NUTS III level.
Since the Government's application was lodged in November last there has been extensive contact and clarification of it at official level with EUROSTAT. EUROSTAT were appraised of the draft proposals in regard to new regional structures prior to their consideration by Government. They are being formally notified of the Government's approval for the new structures and an early decision is now expected from them.
