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Chairman,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
My dear colleagues,
I am delighted to have the opportunity to speak to today’s Committee meeting, to so many parliamentary decision-makers, who address issues relating to urban development and territorial cohesion on a daily basis. Your task is certainly not an easy one. Because however ambitious and elegant it may be to talk of a Europe of the regions and cities, it is far more difficult to translate these ideas into practice. And, as a Member of the German Bundestag and Parliamentary State Secretary at the Federal Ministry of Transport, Building and Urban Affairs, I view myself as being part of the endeavours to tackle this challenge.
About one thing there can be no doubt. Europe thrives on its regions and cities. This is nothing new, but it needs to be emphasized, communicated and put into practice time and again. All players and stakeholders involved in urban development and territorial cohesion – and I believe we all belong to this category – have to engage in a continuous and open dialogue. They have to reach agreement on objectives and action, and thus work together “for the cause”.
The “cause” I am talking about is the unique nature of our European towns and cities and the diversity of our regions with all their characteristics and needs. Both aspects are an expression of our economic, social and cultural model in Europe. However, if we are to agree on a common denominator, we have to adopt an integrated approach when addressing the problems and challenges that face our regions and cities today. Strategies and actions in all relevant policy areas should be dovetailed at EU, national, regional and local level.
What we therefore need, more urgently than ever before, are approaches and measures for integrated urban and regional development.
Why are we addressing this issue during our Council Presidency?
The Federal Minister of Transport, Building and Urban Affairs, Wolfgang Tiefensee, has invited the ministers responsible for urban and spatial development in the EU Member States to an informal meeting in Leipzig on 24 and 25 May. At this meeting, they will engage in a policy debate on future key issues relating to the development of our regions and cities and reach agreement on two strategies. These two strategies, the “Territorial Agenda of the EU” and the “Leipzig Charter on Sustainable European Cities”, are the products of such an integrated approach in the EU. Future policies will be able to build on them. The Agenda and the Charter are two sides of the same coin. And they are the results of a European process.
Both the Territorial Agenda and the Leipzig Charter have been drawn up in an open and transparent process, involving numerous players and stakeholders. Mr Tiefensee launched the dialogue at a conference held in Amsterdam last June. This dialogue is continuing, and today’s debate is a further important building block in the process. The numerous suggestions have helped us to word the Agenda and the Charter in more specific terms.
In Lisbon last October, I, together with my Finnish colleague, had an opportunity to present the first draft of the Territorial Agenda at the 14th session of the Council of Europe’s European Conference of Ministers responsible for Regional Planning. At that conference, we consciously engaged in a dialogue with our neighbours. Subsequently, in Pamplona in November, I presented the evolution of the agenda at the annual conference of the Association of European Border Regions. In the discussions at that meeting, it became clear that the Agenda is the spatial embodiment of our economic, social and cultural model in Europe. Border regions, and thus the immediate living environment of the citizens, play an important role in this context. My colleague, State Secretary Dr Lütke Daldrup, has undertaken a “tour des capitals” in recent months, during which he presented and discussed the Leipzig Charter.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
My dear colleagues,
I was pleased to read your opinion on the Territorial Agenda and the Leipzig Charter. It is not only proof of your active involvement in the process. It also provided us with invaluable assistance in finding the right priorities in evolving the two strategies. I would like to thank you very much for this.
In your opinion, you rightly refer to the principle of the equality of all citizens as the basis for a common perception of territorial cohesion. The Territorial Agenda and the Leipzig Charter have to address the needs of the population at the local level. Because it is the purpose of both strategies to help improve the quality of their communities, regardless of where they live – be it in a deprived urban neighbourhood, in the European core area or in a peripheral region of Europe. We believe that the city-region, i.e. the spatial amalgamation of cities and municipalities – including in rural areas – will, in the future, be one of the key action areas for all of us.
So what does this mean specifically?
In our urban areas, we will champion the development of the inner cities rather than the outer cities. As far as urban development is concerned, greater use is to be made of derelict brownfield sites rather than greenfield sites. We will ensure that more people have access to decent and affordable housing that suits their needs and push ahead with improving the standard of housing and the energy efficiency of the building stock. In doing so, we will lay the foundations for the efficient use of energy and identify measures that can be used to combat the impact of climate change, something that is urgently required.
Another aspect is the implementation of the Lisbon and Gothenburg Strategies. Our regions and cities will not be competitive, innovative and liveable in the long term unless they cooperate with other cities and regions. In the era of the knowledge society, what we need is Europe-wide cooperation, “networking” – cross-border but, above all, transnational. Cooperative schemes are likely to have a significant impact on improving the social balance within and between the cities and regions. This balance is more important than ever before. By agreeing upon the Territorial Agenda and the Leipzig Charter, we want to emphatically support such forms of cooperation.
In an era of limited resources and tight constraints on public funding, we will do everything we can to ensure that all players and stakeholders, especially the private sector, are involved in the processes of urban and regional development. Public-private partnerships can be a suitable instrument here. A progress report on public-private partnerships, which has just been presented by Mr Tiefensee, clearly illustrates just how successfully this model is already being applied in everyday practice. Reservations that existed at the public authority level have been largely overcome. Other EU Member States have similar positive experience. However, when using this model, we must not lose sight of ecological and social standards and their evolution.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
My dear colleagues,
Where do we go from here?
You will certainly agree with me that political strategies cannot be just a flash in the pan or paper tigers. They have to be implemented in a focused and practical manner. Then there is the question of follow-up. The Portuguese and Slovenian Council Presidencies, who are next in line after us, have already agreed to develop a dynamic programme with clearly formulated objectives and actions for the implementation of the strategies and to discuss this programme politically. The German Council Presidency will actively support them in doing so.
Our contribution will be a conference on “Territory and Economy” in the spring of 2008. This conference will present the outcome of the dialogue with players and stakeholders, especially those in the private sector.
In addition, the Slovenian Council Presidency has agreed to place the Territorial Agenda on the agenda of the Spring 2008 meeting of the European Council.
But we do not want to stop working once we have achieved something and rest on our laurels. We have already jointly agreed to submit the Territorial Agenda and the Leipzig Charter to a process of continuous evaluation and impact assessment. In doing so, we want to keep track of whether, and if so to what extent, we have been successful in implementing the strategies.
And we will initiate and conduct a continuous dialogue and exchange of experience on issues relating to the integrated development of our regions and examples of best practice. Because this is the only way to ensure that we have a common perception of the Europe of the regions and cities and that we can all experience it.
Thank you for listening to me.
