Mrs Erna Solberg, Minister of Local
Government and Regional Development
11th Plenary Session of the Congress of
Local and Regional Authorities of the Council of Europe
Draft address on behalf of the
Chairmanship of the Committee of Ministers, (27/5/04 at 10 am)
Mr President,
Distinguished Congresswomen,
Distinguished Congressmen,
I am pleased to address this Plenary Session of The Congress
of Local and Regional Authorities as representative of my country’s
Chairmanship of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe.
Norway has always given priority to the Council of Europe and
actively supported it. The Council of Europe plays an important role in
promoting democracy, human rights and good governance, and in preventing
conflict in our part of the world.
During Norway’s chairmanship, we will do our outmost to put
the Council in an even better position to carry out these important tasks. In a
rapidly changing Europe, we believe that the Council of Europe needs to be open
to reform and change, and that the Council should focus clearly on its main
objectives.
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I shall restrict my statement to three parts.
Firstly, a passage on the priorities of the Norwegian
Chairmanship.
Secondly, I will share with you my government’s vision for
modernizing the Norwegian public sector and local government.
And to round off, some comments about the activities of the
Committee of Ministers and the contribution of the Congress.
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Mr President,
We wish to focus our chairmanship on the following areas:
Firstly: Strengthening human rights and legal co-operation.
The most important priority in this area is to improve the
efficiency of the European Court of Human Rights. Our emphasis on the
Court reflects the fact that the central objectives of our organisation is the
promotion of human rights, the rule of law and good governance, and the
court is one of the mainstays of European efforts to advance human rights.
However, the Court has been struggling with an explosive
increase in its workload in recent years. At the Foreign Ministers’ meeting on
12-13 May this year member countries took important steps in a positive
direction by adopting the amending Protocol to the European Convention on Human
Rights (Protocol no. 14). During the Norwegian chairmanship we will take steps
to follow up these decisions. In order to promote this process, we will be
inviting all member states to a symposium on how we can further
strengthen the protection of human rights through more effective operation of
the Court, and by making the necessary changes at national level in member
states.
As part of its efforts to support human rights, Norway will
also give priority to further measures in the fight against terrorism and
organised crime. These include the preparation of a convention against
trafficking in human beings and steps to secure broad international support for
the Convention on Cybercrime.
Secondly: we will focus on relationships between the
Council of Europe and other organisations, in particular the OSCE and the
EU.
The aim should be for these organisations to complement each
other, and not compete. The Council of Europe and the OSCE are to a large
extent working in the same areas, but often with different approaches. I
believe there is scope for further improving the co-ordination with the OSCE,
keeping in mind that we should both stick to what we do best.
We are pleased with the outcome of the most recent High Level
meeting between the Council of Europe and the European Union, and will seek to
strengthen the dialogue with the EU on the basis of the Joint Declaration from
that meeting.
Thirdly: we wish to strengthen and develop the Council of
Europe’s role in preventing conflict and creating stability.
The Council’s efforts to promote intercultural dialogue and good
governance are important issues in this respect. We will also support dialogue
and contact between religious communities. Norway believes that education has
great potential for promoting knowledge and understanding between cultures and
different ethnic groups. We will be hosting a conference in Oslo on the
religious dimension of intercultural education during our Chairmanship.
Norway sees the work to promote rights of minorities as an
important part of Council of Europe’s activities, and will support a seminar
focussing on measures to assist Roma/Sinti youth.
Mr. President,
The comprehensive network of co-operation that has been
developed within the Council of Europe also contributes to greater
understanding, more stability and more support for fundamental freedoms, all of
which are vital in preventing conflict.
In further developing our organisation as a platform for
dialogue and understanding, close co-operation between the Committee of
Ministers, the Parliamentary Assembly and the Congress of Local and
Regional Authorities is needed.
The two elected bodies already provide important advice and
guidance for our activities. However, in order to promote the objectives of our
organisation they should be even more actively engaged in reviewing and
discussing member states’ commitments and future actions.
Mr. President,
We believe that an active democracy at all levels of
government is important in creating stability and encouraging participation in
society. Through the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of the Council
of Europe extensive co-operation between municipal and regional authorities in
member states has been developed. Norway considers this to be an important
means of contributing to good governance, and wishes to strengthen this
co-operation.
I am strongly convinced that for democratic culture to take
root in society, the principles of democracy must be implemented right down to
the level closest to the citizens. For this reason, Norway values the work that
the Council of Europe has been carrying on for more than forty years to
entrench democracy and build good governance not only from the top down but
also at the grass roots.
The European Charter of Local Self-Government has become the
reference text for decentralisation reforms. On this basis, both your Congress
and the intergovernmental sector develop, today with increased synergy, their
activities aimed at promoting, consolidating and expanding local and regional
democracy.
The rich experience gained is now at the disposal of the newer
member states, including those in South-Eastern Europe and the Southern
Caucasus.
I would like to welcome the recent developments in the
strategic approach of the co-operation and assistance programmes. These are now
well targeted to improve the institutional framework for local government,
build up local authorities responsiveness to the needs of citizens, increase
community engagement and promote citizen participation. The capacity-building activities on local
government training and dissemination of best practice in leadership,
management and service provision have been developing well.
Norway is committed to supporting the intergovernmental
co-operation to reinforce local and regional democracy. We have been very happy
to promote the pilot projects on development of democratic citizenship and
responsive leadership at local level in Bulgaria and Romania. In the context of the Norwegian Chairmanship
of the Committee of Ministers, we are making further efforts to support the
work on capacity building. More
generally, I am confident that innovative co-operation proposals to develop
sound and democratic governance at local level will attract the donor support
they deserve.
Mr President,
During our Chairmanship, Norway will host a conference in Oslo
30 September - 1 October on Strengthening local democracy and democratic
participation in a changing world. We have invited the Council of Europe member
states and The Congress of Local and Regional Authorities to co-operate and
participate in the conference.
Recent experiences gained from Council of Europe projects will
be used to illustrate this important topic. The conference will help to focus
attention on the links between democracy building and conflict prevention.
While all members will be invited to send representatives, we in particularly
would welcome participants from the South-Caucasus region and West Balkan, and
will take active steps in this respect.
Mr. President,
Democracy building must be based on the active participation
of citizens. All countries and regions in Europe are currently considering the
development of local democracy and are facing challenges. Low turnout rates in
local elections indicate declining public interest in politics and weaknesses
in the institutions of local representative democracy. This tendency decreases
the effectiveness, openness and accountability of the system.
A study carried out in 1998 by The Steering Committee of Local
and Regional Democracy concluded that citizens participation in local politics
is not declining but rather changing its form and this challenges the traditional
political system. The trend is towards people
becoming more interested in direct forms of participation. This shift in
the pattern of politics has profound implications for the traditional
institutions of local representative democracy. It implies that local
government requires an open-minded, transparent and flexible approach to engage
the public.
The conference will address these highly important issues and
present initiatives and experiences
from member countries to frame a policy for good governance and democratic
participation at local level.
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Now, Mr. President, let me present my government’s vision for
modernizing the Norwegian public sector and local government.
The main challenges facing the Norwegian public sector are
very similar to what more or less all the western welfare societies are facing.
There is an increasing demand for public services, and there is a demand and
expectation for services that are more and more adapted to the needs and
situation of the individual. There is an increase in the number of elderly
people, and there is a sharp increase in the public expenditure for retirement
and disablement pensions. These factors represent a high level of pressure on
the expenditure side for the local authorities, at a time when the financial
situation for the local authorities is already weak.
Perhaps one should think that Norway, being a small and rather
wealthy nation due to its oil resources, should be able to finance an even
higher level of public services for its inhabitants. This is of course possible
for a short period of time, but would be very unwise in the long run, and is
therefore not the policy of my government. The main reason for this is of course
that our oil reserves are limited and we must be competitive on the
international markets now and in the future. It is therefore of great
importance to develop our exporting industries, which means that the public
expenditure and the wages in the domestic industries cannot be allowed to rise
freely. As in many other western countries, Norway will also face a great
challenge concerning the supply of labour. This is also an important argument
for not letting the public sector grow too large.
The government’s control and directing role over the local
level must balance the consideration for an equal service delivery for every
citizen, and the local level’s maximum freedom to adapt their services to local
needs and develop their community.
The local level in Norway traditionally has a rather large
degree of autonomy, and it has the responsibility for large and demanding tasks
in our welfare system, including childcare, education, various social and
health services, and the care of the elderly. Our policy is to maintain and
strengthen the local level’s role as a service deliverer and a builder of
well-functioning local environments. The policy is based on delegating
responsibilities, decentralisation of tasks and local accountability. To
achieve this, it is however necessary to make important changes at the local
level.
Mr. President,
How then, to achieve the necessary changes? What is the
Norwegian government’s main modernisation policy towards the local level?
My government’s aims is a simpler and more clearly defined
society, a service supply that are adapted to the needs of the individual, a
public sector that is efficient, a public sector that is productive and
efficiency promoting, and a public sector that has a policy for personnel
management that is including and stimulating. Towards the local level, our
efforts run along two main lines.
The first line is to make external conditions better for the
local authorities. That is, to make more room for local politics and local
adaptations, by making the funding system more simple, making more use of
general purpose grants instead of earmarked funds, the laws fewer and less
rigid, reduce reporting requirements, etc.
We are also concerned about the large number of municipalities
in our country, and especially the large number of very small municipalities.
We have 434 municipalities and 19 county authorities in our country with
4,6 million inhabitants. Our median
municipality has 4.400 inhabitants. We think that a lot of these municipalities
are too small and not robust enough to meet the challenges of tomorrow. We have
therefore launched a program that enables the local authorities and their
organisation to make studies outlining the consequences of amalgamations.
The second line is based on encouragement and support from the
central level, supporting modernisation activities at the local level. This
strategy includes funding of research and cutting-edge projects, bringing forth
good examples and best practice, stimulating the spreading of valuable knowledge
in various ways, making public benchmarking results, etc.
An interesting example of the latter is our program called
"Networks for efficiency", which was launched in 2001 as a
co-operation between three ministries and the National Association of Local and
Regional Authorities. The idea is that 5 to 7 municipalities go together and
form a network to study their practice and results in service delivery.
It is my belief that competition is a very strong incentive.
We see now that local authorities take substantially more interest in opening
up their service production for outside contractors, as well as a whole new
attitude towards measuring and benchmarking themselves. It is important that
central government support this development and learning processes.
My government’s vision for good governance and efficiency at
local level is linked to new initiatives to strengthen the participation of
citizens in local public life. The last two decades there has been significant
decrease in the electoral turnout in local and regional elections.
This development has led to a debate in Norway on the
situation of local democracy. Different views have been put forward to explain
why this has happened. On this background my government has appointed a commission to scrutinise the
local democracy situation in Norway. It is also a main objective by
establishing this commission to make a broad agreement across the political
parties on what should be done.
The commission is expected to make their reports within spring
2006. Elements from these issues will, as earlier mentioned, also be discussed
in the Oslo Conference in September this year. I will invite other countries to
present their experiences, and such give valuable input to our national debate
on these issues.
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I now move on, Mr. President, to the third part of my
statement.
In the middle of May, we held the 114th Session of the
Committee of Ministers.
One of the highlights of the Session was the reform of the
European Court of Human Rights. I am delighted that 17 member States signed
the adopted protocol, thus setting in motion the procedure for eventual
ratification by all contracting parties.
High on the agenda of the Session was the proposed Third
Summit. The Vienna Summit of 1993 marked the beginning of the process of
bringing all European democratic states together on an equal footing. We all know the significant progress
achieved since then. The Third Summit will lay the guidelines for the Council
of Europe’s future action and its interaction with other international
organisations and institutions. And
Ministers emphasised that the Third Summit would confirm the strategic
objective of a Europe without dividing lines, based on democracy, the rule of
law and the respect for human rights.
The contribution of the Congress to the file for the Summit
has been most welcome. We look forward to ongoing co-operation on preparatory
work once the date has been fixed by the Deputies within the summer.
The Council of Europe contribution to international action
against terrorism is one of the Committee of Ministers’ pressing
priorities. Terrorism seriously jeopardises the enjoyment of human rights and
constitutes a serious threat to democracy.
Other major challenges, which were discussed at the Ministers
Meeting in May were organised crime, including money laundering and trafficking
in human beings.
Another subject of particular interest to the Congress is that
dealing with the creation of a European Forum for Roma and Travellers.
Let me also touch briefly on monitoring and the observation of
elections.
In particular, the monitoring of the implementation of the
European Charter of Local Self-government plays an important part in this process.
So far, 35 states have been monitored and the monitoring cycle will, I
understand, be complete by 2007. We shall have the opportunity of raising this
with you, when you discuss the question with the Deputies at a meeting devoted
to the monitoring of local and regional democracy.
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Mr President, I look forward to your reactions now or later. I
shall now reply to the questions tabled. I also pledge a speedy reply to your
Recommendations. The Committee of Ministers record in this respect has improved
dramatically in recent years. And, I shall do my best to improve it even
further.
Thank you very much for your attention!
