Executive Committee

Minutes of the 31st Executive Committee Meeting on 18^th October 2002, Borås, Sweden.

NSC Executive Committee Participants:

President: Cllr. Bent Hansen (Viborg)
Vice-President: Cllr. Gunn Marit Helgesen (Telemark)
Belgian Representative: Not represented
Danish Representative: Cllr. Harry Jensen (Ringkjøbing)
Dutch Representative: Cllr. Joop Boertjens, accompanied by Toine Janssen (SNN)
English Representative: Not represented
German Representative: Represented by Peter Wieland, (Niedersachsen)
Norwegian Representative: Not represented
Scottish Representative: Cllr. Audrey Findlay (Aberdeenshire) and Cllr. Alison McInnes (Aberdeenshire) accompanied by Bruce Manson (Fife)
Swedish Representative: Cllr. Jan Hallberg (Västra Götaland) accompanied by Jörgen Niemann

NSC Executive Secretary: Henrik M Jensen
NSC Assistant Executive Sec.: Karen Greve Somerset

CPMR: Patrick Anvroin

NSC Thematic Group Co-ordinators present:

Business Development:  Vivien Collie, (Fife)
Transport & Communications:  Jon Halvard Eide (Vest-Agder)
Culture & Tourism: Geir Sør-Reime (Rogaland)
Education & Research: Ann Brown (Suffolk)
Environment: Per Hörberg (Västra Götaland)
Fisheries: Ann Bell (Aberdeenshire)

The President started by welcoming everyone to the 31st Executive Committee and he thanked Västra Götaland Region for hosting this meeting.

1. Minutes of the 30th Executive Committee meeting
The minutes were approved as a true record of the meeting.

2. Summary of Thematic Meeting on 17th October 2002
Henrik M. Jensen gave a brief update of the meeting on the previous day, which had proved to be very interesting. It was considered a good way of getting to know the other countries around the North Sea and to better understand how they work. He pointed out that two main issues ran though the presentations and that were the structuring of the regions and healthcare. All the presentations will be available on the NSC website.

NSC General Assembly 2003
This item had been postponed from the previous day and Peter Wieland gave a short presentation of the draft programme. It was agreed that the title should be “A common strategy for a sustainable economic development in the North Sea Region” The theme was considered broad enough to enable the Thematic Groups to work within it.

The President also reminded delegates that it would be election year for the President, vice-presidents and most members of the Executive Committee.

3. Financial Matters

3a. Financial Statement up to 23rd September 2002
Henrik M Jensen presented the financial statement. Only one region, Euregio Scheldemond, has not yet paid their subscription for 2002.

Currently not much money has been spent, but that is mainly due to the fact that the bill from the General Assembly had only been received a few days previously. The co-ordinators have not spent all their money yet either, but they will do so before the end of the year. With the new members having joined and the travelling budget staying within its proposed budget, the Secretariat hopes not to have a deficit this year.

3b. Membership Up-date
The list of current members had been updated with the recent new members added. However, there is still a gap on the English coast, which the NSC would like to see filled. Ann Bell pointed out that the Fisheries Partnership will hold its meeting in January in Newcastle and it may be an opportunity to inform the region about the advantages of membership of the NSC. This would be looked into.

The President mentioned that he had only on the previous day returned from a visit to the Faroe Islands. They are considering applying for membership and they are particularly interested in the NSC Fisheries Partnership. It was agreed that the President should make contact with them.

4. Thematic Groups

4a. Recent and future activities

Fisheries Group
Ann Bell presented the report of the Fisheries Group. The group held its last meeting on 10th-11th October in Inverness, Scotland. It was a busy meeting as the group is organising 2 conferences. The first one is a follow-up of the conference on predators, which took place in Ringkjøbing in the autumn of 2001. This one will take place on 30th 31st January 2003 in Tjärnö on the west coast of Sweden. It will be titled “Who owns the sea?” and will both look at the political as well as the practical dimension to topics such as energy, pollution, regulations, responsible fisheries etc. and not just look at fishermen. The conference will be by invitation only. This conference will also lead into the seminar, which is planned to take place in Brussels in spring 2003.

The second conference, which the Fisheries Group wishes to organise, deals with the changing role of women in agricultural and fishing areas. The conference is likely to be a joint conference among many of the NSC Thematic Groups and it will share common areas of concern to these areas and look at such things as diversification, education, training etc.

At its meeting in Scotland recently, Mr. Andrew Blackadder, who is the leader of the CPMR Intercom Group of Fisheries, attended and it was suggested giving the Intercom Group more support and to help bring it forward, as it has an important role to play, in order that the Northern dimension is not lost.

Concerning the NSC Fisheries Partnership, it held its last meeting at ICES in Copenhagen where it looked at the assessment of fish stocks. Some overseas independent experts had been called in to look at the process. Both the fishermen and the scientists gained a lot from the week-long meeting. The next meeting will be Newcastle on 22-24 January and the following meeting in June in Hamburg, as which some additional German people will be invited.

Harry Jensen expressed the need to follow up on the wind energy conference arranged by the Environment Group in November in Belgium, at which he will attend, and he hoped that someone from the Environment Group could attend the Tjärnö conference in January to give an update.

Following a suggestion from Ann Bell, it was agreed that the president should write to ICES asking for the NSC to gain observer status.

Education and Research Group
Ann Brown highlighted some items from the work of the group. The Group has not had a meeting since the last Executive Committee meeting but it will meet on 6th-7th November in Blankenberge at the same time as the Environment Group. The group is looking to broaden the spectrum of attendees, which mainly seem to come from further education establishments.

The group has been working on an Interreg project together with the Business Development Group and it is expected it will be submitted by the spring deadline. It is called the North Sea Exchange Protocol and deals with SMEs networking with education institutions and public authorities. The project has been pre-assessed by the Interreg Secretariat and had received some good comments, but it suggested changing the priority, so that is what the group is now looking into.

The Education & Research Group is also planning its first conference, probably with the Transport & Communication Group, which will look at new technologies and flexible learning.

Transport & Communication Group
Jon Halvard Eide mentioned that the Transport & Communication Group continues to deal with sustainable transport, influencing the EU and it is currently looking at possibilities for co-operating with the Business Development Group. At its next meeting at the end of October, the co-ordinator of the Business Development Group, Vivien Collie, will attend and they will also look at ICT and its significance for the transport sector.

The Group has delayed submission of its Interreg project, as they are awaiting the experiences gained from a project currently running in Scotland.

As far as the co-operation with the CPMR is concerned, Jon has met with Patrick Anvroin where they discussed issues, such as involving more regions in the work of the CPMR Intercom Group, the importance of regions getting the opportunity of make an input to the CPMR, but also that the NSC feels that the CPMR should do more in the field of sustainable transport.

Jon also drafted the speech for Bent Hansen to present at the CPMR General Assembly and it was commented on how useful it was that Bent gave the speech and helped start the debate at the General Assembly.

Environment Group
Per Hörberg mentioned that his group is busy preparing for the conference and Annual Business Meeting at the beginning of November. About 100 people have registered of which 25 are politicians. A Political Visioning workshop has been divided into 2, with one of the sessions only open to politicians.

At the Annual Business Meeting, the group will discuss new ways of working following a paper by the vice-chair, Alison McInnes. The group may take on more responsibilities in addition to what it already does. The CONSSO meetings are also on the agenda.

The group has also been busy with Interreg projects and have had 2 projects approved, some have been submitted in September and more will be submitted in the spring 2003 as well.

Business Development Group
Vivien Collie reported that the Business Development Group had its meeting last meeting in Ålborg, Denmark, on 23rd August at which they had some very interesting presentations and discussions.

An Interreg project proposal dealing with E-Business has been submitted and they are now hoping for its approval. The group would also like to be involved in the project dealing with rural development, as well as the conference on women in agricultural and fishing communities. Vivien will in addition also attend the Transport & Communication group meeting at the end of October, as well as running one of the workshops at the Environment Group conference.

However, the group would also like to move on from pure project work, which is a topic, which will be discussed at the next meeting taking place in Aberdeen on 5th-6th December.

Culture & Tourism Group
Geir Sør-Reime reported on the work of the Culture & Tourism Group. They had their last meeting two weeks previously, at which it was discussed how to follow up on the Vision to Action document. It was, for example, decided to write a memorandum to the CPMR concerning Interreg IV, but the group also looked at Culture 2000 which runs until 2006 and how the group would like to influence the content of any future programmes, so that the common cultural heritage, which we share around the North Sea can be better supported.

The North Sea Festival of Youth took place in September in Kristiansand and the group had a summary of the event at its meeting. Vest-Agder as host region put in 500.000 NOK and the NSC contributed with merely 45.000 Dkr, so it may be difficult for the NSC to ask regions to host some of our future events, but with the small budget of the NSC, it is unfortunately impossible to fund events with more money.

The group had considered at its meeting to look into the possibilities of funding some events in cities, which have been given status as European Capital of Culture. It was felt that Bruges had been a missed opportunity for the NSC, as no events with a North Sea angle had been organised there. The next opportunity, however, will be in 2007 where there are, among others, 20 candidate cities from the UK. Stavanger, Norway, is also a candidate as a Capital of Culture outside the EU.

The President thanked all the co-ordinators for all their hard work and for presenting the reports.

4b. Nomination for vice-chair of the Transport & Communication Group
Following the decision at the last Executive Committee meeting to contact the EMRLGA to see if they had a politician, who would be interested in becoming vice-chair of the Transport & Communication Group, the NSC Secretariat had received a nomination from Cllr. Jim Wade, who is based in Northamptonshire Council. He was unanimously accepted as vice-chair of the Transport & Communication Group. The NSC Secretariat is particularly pleased to have someone from EMRLGA involved, as it is the direct result of a NSC meeting in Grantham in February. Jim Wade will attend the Wind Energy Conference in Blankenberg in November.

5. Application of conference money for 2003
Contrary to a few years ago, the Thematic Groups are now joining efforts across the groups and are involved in many joint projects and conferences. Four conferences are planned for 2003: Women in fishing and agricultural communities, which has the support of all the groups, a follow-up of the predators conference from the autumn 2001, which will be held in Tjärnö in Sweden at the end of January 2003, the Environment’s Annual Meeting and Conference to be held in the autumn 2003 and finally a joint conference between the Education & Research Group and Transport & Communication Group on new technologies and flexible learning.

As no details had been submitted to the NSC Secretariat beforehand, it was not easy for the Executive Committee to make any distinctions between the conferences, so they had an equal share of the 120.000 dkr available, i.e. 30.000 dkr to each.

It was agreed that details of the proposed conference including a draft budget must be submitted next year in order to be considered for funding.

6. Update on the rural development project
This Interreg project proposal originates from the Environment Group conference in 2001 and it is now planned that it will be submitted in the spring 2003. Viborg Amt is the lead partner and there will be one partner in each country, which is interested in participating. A first planning meeting took place in Viborg on the 10th October with participants from Scotland, England and Norway. Henrik M Jensen would also have a meeting with a Swedish representative later the same day. The Dutch are positive towards the project and so are the Germans, who will follow it up.

It is proposed to concentrate on three main topics; economic development, healthcare services and transport. It is supposed to consist of testing and implementation phases and will not be a “paper project”.

Patrick Anvroin commented that the CPMR agricultural and rural intercom group may be interested in having a presentation of the project sometime in the future. He also mentioned that the North Sea Commission has only used its one representative on the group, who is Jim Knowles from Aberdeenshire. People, who are interested in joining this group should contact the NSC Secretariat.

7. Update on NSC Fisheries Seminar
Ann Bell gave an update of the proposed seminar, which is planned to take place in Brussels in spring 2003. If a success, it will the first of many high profile seminars organised to raise the political profile of the NSC.

It is clear that the seminar is relevant to nearly all of the NSC Thematic Groups and it is expected that the co-ordinators will be rapporteurs at the various workshops and that members of the Executive Committee will chair some of the sessions.

The NSC is hoping for some financial support from DG Fish, as it will be very expensive to organise. It was also pointed out that the North Sea Commission is very cheap for the CPMR compared to the other geographical commissions, so it was agreed that the NSC should write to Xavier Gizard, CPMR, asking for a financial contribution towards the running of the conference. The conference in itself is also very relevant to the CPMR and the other geographical commissions.

8. North Sea Conference/CONSSO
Per Hörberg mentioned that the next conference will take place in Göteborg in 2005/06. A first planning meeting is scheduled for 13th-14th November to discuss how the conference should be held. No detailed plans have been produced yet, so it is a good opportunity for the NSC to have a say in how we would like the conferences to progress.

Following the Bergen declaration, the Secretariat, which is the Ministry of Environment in Sweden, has proposed establishing three issue groups dealing with the prosecution of offenders, shipping and fishing. It was agreed that the NSC should concentrate its efforts on shipping as fisheries already has a relative high profile within the NSC. It is possible for an organisation like the NSC to partly co-ordinate the work of these groups and it was agreed that Per Hörberg should look at the available resources of member regions and the issue will then be discussed again at the next Executive Committee meeting.

9. Interreg IIIB North Sea Programme
As the second call closed on 30th September the Interreg Secretariat had received 28 projects asking for 52 mill. Euro in funding. There is about 130 mill. Euro available in total and with 11 calls for projects, an average of 10-12 mill. Euro can be granted each time. This means there is fierce competition for the money. The projects are now being checked for eligibility and the Steering Committee will make its decision on 25th-26th November in Viborg.

The Interreg Secretariat had considered it was not in a position to evaluate the 5 projects dealing with SMEs and ICT, so a group of external experts nominated by the national governments has been called in. It is hoped that this process will not delay the decision process.

The next deadline is 1st March 2003.

10. CPMR activities
Patrick Anvroin presented recent CPMR activities. Concerning the Convention, which will result in proposals for a new treaty in January 2003, the CPMR has written a memorandum and also co-ordinated a joint position for 4 other organisations representing local and regional authorities. The President expressed his concern with the fact that the CPMR has not strongly enough emphasised the need for a level playing field with respect to regions, which have legislative powers and those, which do not. The CPMR must clearly distance itself from the attempts by regions with legislative powers to create a special status for themselves in the future European decision-making process.

The Executive Committee fully supported the concern stated by the President and the Executive Committee recommended that the CPMR states this clearly in its recommendations to the Convention.

Concerning the work of the CPMR Intercom Groups, Patrick mentioned that the group dealing with environment is in need of being re-orientated and they are also looking for a chair for the group.

At the CPMR General Assembly in Greece in September, a new President was elected, who is Claudio Martini from Tuscany, Italy. He has been elected for 2 years.

The next Political Bureau meeting will take place on 2-3 December in Poitou-Charentes in France, at which Objective 2, among other things, will be discussed.

Further details on the activities of CPMR can be found on www.cpmr.org

11. Correspondence to and from the NSC
A letter from the Environment Agency in England regarding Sellafield had been received following the NSC’s comments on the proposed decision. Audrey Findlay pointed out that Scottish regions would like to follow it up by writing to UK Minister of the Environment, Michael Meacher, with a copy to relevant people within the Scottish Executive. Gunn Marit Helgesen mentioned that Norwegian regions probably would also like to be involved and she asked for the NSC Secretariat to send her details of what the NSC has done so far with respect to Sellafield.

It was agreed that Per Hörberg would liaise with Ann Bell and Sverre Fosse before a letter could be written.

Geir Sør-Reime also mentioned that Sellafield is of great concern to regions around the Irish Sea and that is may be possible to establish a partnership with other CPMR regions, which the NSC could lead.

It was agreed that it is very important to keep up the pressure and the President was pleased to see that the Scottish regions will try to progress it further.

12. Date and location of next meeting
Henrik M Jensen mentioned that Laus Coppoolse, Euregio Scheldemond, has invited the Executive Committee to have its next meeting in Middleburg, Zeeland, the Netherlands, on 20-21 March 2003. The meeting will be preceded by a thematic meeting on the Thursday afternoon.

13. Any Other Business
Toine Janssen, SNN, mentioned an article in a Danish magazine concerning oil extraction in the Wadden Sea. A study from the Wadden Sea was tabled.

Peter Wieland pointed out that a joint conference between Bremen and Lower Saxony will take place in January 2003. It is hoped the conference can bring politicians together from different German regions and to make the NSC more publicly known in Germany. Many of the same politicians will also be invited to the Political Meeting at the General Assembly.

Ann Bell stated that it would be advantageous for the NSC to apply for observer status of OSPAR and she had been advised that it would be best if it was granted through the CPMR. It was agreed that the President should write to the CPMR asking them to apply on behalf of the NSC.

Finally, Henrik M Jensen mentioned a large OECD conference in Paris in January 2003. Bent Hansen had been asked to speak at the conference, but was unable to do so. It was agreed to send the details to Gunn Marit Helgesen to see if she would be able to speak at it.

Karen Greve Somerset
North Sea Commission