Malta is on the right track in its management of the €855 million in EU funds acquired for 2007-2013 and the European Commission said there were “no concerns” the island could lose this capital.
The Commission said Malta had a “good rate of commitment”, an assessment made by Regional Policy Commissioner Johannes Hahn in reply to Labour MEP Edward Scicluna’s parliamentary question.
Prof. Scicluna wanted to know why Malta was receiving “low grant payments” and whether this was a result of failure by Maltese authorities to prepare suitable projects for EU funding or failure to complete the projects for which EU funding had been committed.
Prof. Scicluna argued that according to his calculations Malta should receive €122.1 million a year and so far was receiving 50 per cent less. He also wanted to know whether any “unspent funds” from the current budgetary period could be carried over to the new financial cycle.
However, according to Mr Hahn there were no failures and Prof. Scicluna’s calculations were based on the wrong premise.
Mr Hahn explained that EU funds were not allocated to member states on an annual basis but on a “commitment” basis.
“The annual financial commitments of the programme are not spread equally over the years of the programming period and are specific to the funds, not to individual projects or other operations.
“In the case of Malta, the annual commitment instalments for 2008-10 are to be de-committed three years after their commitment, while the instalments for 2011-13 are to be de-committed two years after their commitment.”
This meant Malta had until 2015 to spend these funds.
With regard to the rate at which Malta was committing its allocation and whether there was any apparent risk some of these funds might eventually be lost, Mr Hahn assured Prof. Scicluna this did not appear to be the case.
Given the nature of numerous projects being funded under the programmes – largely consisting of major infrastructure and equipment, as well as relatively large scale investments in employment and education measures – the initial years were characterised by slower implementation.
However, Mr Hahn assured Prof. Scicluna “there is a good rate of commitment of the funds in projects and schemes” and it was expected that expenditure would accelerate in the coming months and years, with Malta reaching the agreed spending targets.
“At this stage there is no concern about the level of expenditure to be declared in 2011,” Mr Hahn said.
The 2007-2013 EU budgetary period is the second cycle for Malta since its accession in 2004. Apart from pre-accession funds, Malta also won an allocation of €88.7 million from the 2004-2006 financial perspective.
According to the Commission’s assessment, Malta managed to utilise its first allocation to the full.