34 Amendments of Laura AGEA related to 2016/2098(INI)
Amendment 5 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 21 a (new)
Citation 21 a (new)
- having regard to Special Report 19/2016 of the EU Court of Auditors on implementing the EU budget through financial instruments,
Amendment 13 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital C
Recital C
C. whereas the European Investment Fund (EIF) and the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI) plays a key role in complementing the EIB’s interventions as the EU’s specialist vehicle for venture capital and guarantees aimed primarily at supporting SMEs and European integration and regional cohesion;
Amendment 29 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 3
Paragraph 3
3. Recalls Parliament’s request to present a more comprehensive and harmonised annual report for a better overview and evaluation of the EIB’s overall activities and lending priorities; invites the EIB to further refine and provide information on anticipated economic, social and environmental impacts; considers it necessary to arrange for a country-by-country report, including for third countries, indicating clearly, in this case, whether the planned EU guarantee has been used;
Amendment 34 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 4
Paragraph 4
4. Emphasises that all EIB-financed activities must be part of and steadily consistent with the EU’s general strategy and political priority areas as defined in the Europe 2020 strategy, the Growth and Employment Facility and the Compact for Growth and Jobs, while integrating the economic and financial efficiency criteria; considers it desirable, in this context, that the projects funded should be the subject of an independent ex ante assessment based not only on economic criteria but also on social and environmental criteria and that an ex post assessment should be made to check that these criteria have been respected;
Amendment 43 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 6
Paragraph 6
6. Recalls that supporting economic recovery and sustainable growth is an overarching objective and that the EIB should anticipate structural challenges, notably those related to Europe’s re- industrialisation and the knowledge-based and digital economy, in order to generate new economic opportunities, innovation, the development of a circular economy and use of renewables in line with the goals of environmental, climate or energy policies; stresses that the process of reindustrialisation must be undertaken while taking into account on the one hand the need to create high-quality jobs and on the other hand the various situations that exist in the European economy, but always having due regard for the environment and the health of workers and members of the public;
Amendment 57 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9
Paragraph 9
9. Acknowledges that the EIB is a core actor needed to revitalise the EU economy and maximise the effectiveness and value for money of available financial resources by using revolving instruments, namely through a multiplier effect of guarantee funds and leveraging classical EU financial instruments such as grants; notes the conclusions of the Court of Auditors, which observes that hitherto only a limited number of financial instruments have been successful in providing revolving financial support and that in general the financial instruments have not succeeded in attracting private capital; draws attention to the need to provide ab initio clear and concrete estimated leverage for the funds of financial instruments;
Amendment 64 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 11
Paragraph 11
11. Reiterates, in this respect, that morefull information should be given on the precise nature of individual projects funded directly or indirectly through the EIB’s lending activities, and, in particular, on their added value and expected impact and that it is necessary to attach an independent ex ante assessment and an ex post assessment which take into account the results anticipated and achieved in economic, social and environmental terms;
Amendment 80 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 17
Paragraph 17
17. Highlights that an ambitious investment strategy must be coupled with monitoring and reporting instruments that serve performance management and economic, social and environmental impact assessment;
Amendment 83 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 18
Paragraph 18
18. Encourages the EIB to continuously put an emphasis on its performance scrutiny via performance assessments and proven impact; encourages the EIB to continue to define its monitoring indicators, more specifically indicators of additionality, with a view to assessing the impact as early as possible in the project generation phase, and providing the Board with sufficient information on the expected impact, in particular with regard to the contribution to EU social and environmental policies;
Amendment 89 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 21
Paragraph 21
21. Recalls that the EIB has worldwide responsibilities in ensuring the EU’s attractiveness on the world stage by promoting a conducive investment climate for business and enterprises, particularly those which are local;
Amendment 101 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 26
Paragraph 26
26. Supports all the incentives for market-driven innovation and those, social development and environmental protection, maintaining sustainable growth and careful use of resources, and incentives which helping the EU’s ambition to become a circular, knowledge-based economy and maintain the EU’s competitiveness;
Amendment 103 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 27
Paragraph 27
Amendment 107 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 28
Paragraph 28
Amendment 110 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 29
Paragraph 29
29. Invites the EIB to define a new global infrastructure agenda based on efficient projects of common interest such as transport (Connected Europe), while considering their compatibility with climate and environmental policy objectives and regional development; considers it vital that people living in the vicinity of the projects funded should be actively involved in assessing them;
Amendment 114 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 29 a (new)
Paragraph 29 a (new)
29a. Deplores the involvement of the EIB in large-scale infrastructure projects with a serious environmental impact and lacking in real added economic and social value for the local population; stresses furthermore that such projects have little impact on the creation of new jobs and that the cost-benefit ratio is not such as to make such investments sustainable; calls on the EIB to finance only those projects whose implementation is not environmentally, financially or socially controversial, as demonstrated by a thorough prior assessment and an adequate cost-benefit analysis;
Amendment 115 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 29 b (new)
Paragraph 29 b (new)
29b. Notes with concern the tendency to allocate ever more EU public resources to high CO2-emitting infrastructure projects, motorways in particular; stresses, moreover, that assessments of the viability of such projects are often based on inaccurate and excessively optimistic forecasts of traffic flows and toll profits, thus resulting in significant and unexpected disbursement of public resources to ensure profit for private entities, as in the case of the EUR 700 million allocated to the project for the completion of the Brescia-Bergamo-Milan stretch of motorway, which was found to be financially unsustainable and of dubious economic and social benefit; calls on the EIB to carry out thorough advance assessments of the financial viability of the projects that it funds and to refrain from financing projects at odds with the EU’s long-term objectives of moving towards a CO2-free economy and with the principle of additionality;
Amendment 122 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 31
Paragraph 31
31. Believes it necessary to continue the development of a market for sustainable green projects, above all promoting the creation of a circular economy, in particular via a green bond market;
Amendment 123 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 32
Paragraph 32
32. Notes the increase of the external mandate from EUR 10 to 27 billion, with an additional optional amount of EUR 3 billion; recalls the need to constantly maintain the coherence of this mandate with the objectives of the EU’s external policy, particularly with regard to respect for civil rights in the countries receiving financing; reiterates Parliament’s request to the European Court of Auditors to prepare a special report on the alignment with EU policies of EIB external lending interventions and their performance;
Amendment 127 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 33 a (new)
Paragraph 33 a (new)
33a. Expresses concern about certain infrastructure projects in Africa financed by the EIB which are linked to tax havens, as well as about their environmental and social impact, such as the Tenke-Fungurume copper/cobalt mine in the Democratic Republic of Congo, the West African Gas Pipeline from Nigeria to Ghana and the Mopani copper-mining project in Zambia;
Amendment 128 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 33 b (new)
Paragraph 33 b (new)
33b. Notes with concern that Turkey is the primary beneficiary of non-EU EIB funding, itself the primary external funding institution in Turkey, which received roughly 3.5% of all EIB loans granted in 2015; stresses the need to make EIB funding conditional on the upholding of human rights and fundamental freedoms, democracy and the rule of law by beneficiary countries;
Amendment 129 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 34
Paragraph 34
34. Notes that the EFSI aims at leveragingto provide through the EIB a total of EUR 315 billion in extra investment and new projects in the real economy by 2018; observes that 97 infrastructure and innovation projects and 192 SME financing agreements have been approved, representing a total expected investment of EUR 115.7 billion; deplores the almost total lack of information and disaggregated statistical data on the 97 projects financed thus far, in particular with regard to the expected impact, benefits and additionality of each individual project; calls on the EIB to publish all available information about and findings of impact assessments for operations carried out within the framework of the EFSI;
Amendment 131 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 35
Paragraph 35
35. Recognises that the implementation of the EFSI has rapidly changed the profile and business model of the EIB in terms of processes and monitoring of signatures and contracts; considers it desirable that the existing monitoring systems which are prescribed for projects financed by the EIB should at least be guaranteed;
Amendment 132 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 36
Paragraph 36
36. Notes that in order to make full use of the additional risk bearing capacity, the EIB Group is developing various new products that will allow for higher risk taking (e.g. subordinated debt, equity-type, risk sharing with banks), and has reviewed its credit risk policy and eligibilities to allow for increased flexibility; the EIB is increasing its support to innovative companies or to infrastructure projects, as with the support of the EFSI; the EIB can support a larger number of these risky projects without compromising the principles of sound management;
Amendment 139 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 41
Paragraph 41
41. Calls on the EIB to pay particular attention to the principle of additionality and to provide full and relevant qualitative management information on the implementation of the EFSI stated objectives, showing their effective additionality and impact compared with benchmarks, but also in view of the extension of the EFSI beyond 2017;
Amendment 140 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 41 a (new)
Paragraph 41 a (new)
41a. Deplores the fact that the list of projects chosen to receive funding under the EFSI includes infrastructure installations with serious environmental impact and dubious additionality, such as biorefineries, steelworks, regasification and gas storage facilities and motorways; criticises the fact that in many cases the EIB has failed to take action on reports from local authorities, stakeholder communities and civil society groups of environmental and social legislation being breached by funding recipients and by the projects financed, claiming that it was not its responsibility to carry out the necessary investigations; calls on the EIB, with reference to the precautionary principle, to withdraw funding wherever there is any suspicion of environmental infringements and damage to society or to local communities;
Amendment 147 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 47
Paragraph 47
47. Believes that the enhanced economic role of the EIB, its increased investment capacity and the use of the EU budget to guarantee the EIB’s operations must be accompanied by greater transparency and deepened accountability so as to ensure genuine public scrutiny of its activities, project selection and funding priorities; considers it essential, in this context, that the EIB should disclose information on the individual projects, as required by the EFSI Regulation;
Amendment 150 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 49 a (new)
Paragraph 49 a (new)
49a. Calls on the EIB once again to improve significantly its policies on non- cooperative jurisdictions, in line with Parliament’s earlier recommendations; stresses in particular the need to make the allocation of direct and indirect loans conditional on the publication of tax and financial data country by country, and on the sharing of beneficial ownership data for the beneficiaries and financial intermediaries involved in the financing operations; insists on the need for the EIB to establish a thorough public list of selection criteria for financial intermediaries, so as to step up the EU’s commitment to combating tax abuse and to prevent more effectively the risks of corruption and infiltration by criminal groups to which many EIB projects have been exposed;
Amendment 151 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 49 b (new)
Paragraph 49 b (new)
49b. Welcomes the recent establishment of a Memorandum of Understanding between the EIB and the Italian Anti- Corruption Authority (ANAC), whose aim is to step up the fight against corruption through information exchange and mutual technical and operational support; urges the EIB to make the agreement operational as soon as possible in order to improve the prior assessment of the risks of corruption and infiltration by criminal groups associated with the projects selected and thus to prevent EIB-financed projects from becoming embroiled in corruption, as in the case of the Passante di Mestre motorway route;
Amendment 154 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 51
Paragraph 51
51. Welcomes the report on the implementation of the EIB Group Transparency policy for 2015 and the upcoming review of the EIB whistleblowing policy; considers that the EIB should apply the highest possible standards of transparency and protection of whistle-blowers, going beyond the current arrangements;
Amendment 156 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 52
Paragraph 52
52. Recalls that transparency in the implementation of EU policies not only leads to strengthening the EIB’s overall corporate accountability and credibility, with a clear overview of the type of financial intermediaries and final beneficiaries, but also contributes to enhancing the effectiveness and sustainability of the funded projects alongside a zero-tolerance approach to fraud and corruption in its loan portfolio; calls on the EIB to align itself with the new rapid alert and exclusion system planned by the Commission;
Amendment 157 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 52 a (new)
Paragraph 52 a (new)
52a. Notes with concern that the EIB, despite awarding three times as much financing as the World Bank, has blacklisted only three entities, whereas the World Bank has blacklisted 820; calls on the EIB, in order to remedy this situation, to join forces with the network of other public banks dealing with blacklisting, a network which includes the World Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD);
Amendment 164 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 55 a (new)
Paragraph 55 a (new)
55a. Reiterates its request for information on the contracting and subcontracting system to be made public and easily accessible, and for Parliament to be guaranteed access to the associated financial information and documentation in all cases;
Amendment 168 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 56
Paragraph 56
56. Invites the EIB, in accordance with its wide scope of intervention, to better prevent conflicts of interest in its governing bodies and potential revolving doors issues; deplores the fact that the Ombudsman has noted that the declarations of interests of members of the management committee published on the website are insufficient to determine the risk of conflicts of interests; expresses its concern about the fact that at present the Board of Directors applies an ad hoc system for the management of conflicts of interests; calls for a single and unequivocal protocol to be instituted by the end of 2017 to prevent all risks at all levels;
Amendment 171 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 56 a (new)
Paragraph 56 a (new)
56a. Considers it essential that Vice- Presidents of the EIB should not be responsible for projects financed in their countries of origin and that sectoral rather than territorial remits should be assigned;