The EU should ensure that local and regional authorities are more deeply involved in the formulation and implementation of cohesion and regional development policies, according to a new report by the Committee of the Regions.

It calls on the European Commission and the European Parliament to make broader use of partnerships with the local and regional authorities, as they represent the level of government „where a significant proportion of Community policies are usually conducted“. The report's author, Bulgarian member Vladimir Kissiov, urges the Commission to draft a methodology which clearly defines the operation and minimum extent of a partnership approach at all stages in the policy process, from preparation and implementation to monitoring and evaluation.

He says the system must take account of the various levels of decentralisation in different Member States and whether their local and regional bodies are the managing authority for operational programmes. The Committee of the Regions, together with the Parliament and European Economic and Social Committee, should be key partners in putting the methodology together, he adds.

Kissiov, a member of Sofia Municipal Council and the European People's Party group in the Committee of the Regions (CoR), says the involvement of local and regional authorities, as well as a greater role for the CoR, is a „prerequisite for the successful planning of territorial development as well as for building and extending administrative and communication capacity (…) with a view to overcoming the administrative deficit often cited as an obstacle to development“.

His report, compiled at the request of the European Parliament and recently adopted by the CoR's Commission for Territorial Cohesion Policy, states that economic and social partners and civil society must also have an input at the earliest possible stages in formulating positions and priorities. However, Kissiov underlines that, as elected bodies directly accountable to the EU's citizens, local and regional authorities must take precedence.

The CoR will draw up annual recommendations for improving regional and local-level partnership, as well as supporting initiatives by Member States, the Parliament and the European Commission for developing such partnerships, particularly at the drafting stage of policy-making, he says.

Kissiov stresses that a broader use of partnerships, „involving a maximum number of stakeholders“, is crucial in relation to the implementation of the EU's jobs and growth strategy and the ratification process of the Lisbon Treaty, which streamlines the EU's institutional set-up and explicitly recognises the principle of local and regional autonomy.

The report, which will feed into the Parliament's own opinion on the issue on partnership and governance, is due to be adopted by the CoR's plenary session on 9–10 October.