Incorporation of the ECSC in the EC budget

In the report by Joan COLOM I NAVAL the Committee on Budgets has called for the ECSC - the Treaty establishing that Community is due to expire in the year 2002 - to be incorporated into the EU budget. The committee is reiterating its view that activities such as research and social and regional measures should be phased out of the ECSC framework and phased into the appropriate EU budgetary framework. Parliament, in its capacity as legislative and budgetary authority, should be closely involved in the process. The Commission is being called upon to produce a study - which it was due to submit in spring 1996(!) - setting out a detailed picture of the current situation and the prospects for ECSC reserves. It should also provide information about borrowing and lending operations. Furthermore, in anticipation of enlargement, it will need to say what arrangements it will make under the PHARE and TACIS programmes to enable the coal and steel industries in the Central and Eastern European countries to complete the necessary transition. The Committee on Budgets believes that the balances of remaining ECSC assets should be transferred to the Union and could be administered by an EU body. The Commission should draw up a study with a view to establishing a European coal and steel foundation or agency, the initial capital of which would consist of the remaining ECSC appropriations. (Operating and administrative expenditure would be covered in the EU budget). In the committee's opinion, interest earned on the capital should be paid into the EU budget and used to finance multi-annual research programmes relating to coal and steel or the social situation. �