UK RESEARCH & INNOVATION PRESIDENCY SERVICE
(July - December 2005)

The UK Presidency during the second half of 2005 took place during a challenging period for the European Union. Nevertheless, we succeeded in delivering positive outcomes on a range of issues, including reaching agreement on a new EU budget. The UK worked closely with the European Commission, Parliament and other Member States, setting out to deliver progress across the EU agenda by running an effective, impartial and business-like EU Presidency. One key aim was to promote economic reform, in particular increasing investment in research and turning more research into innovation. The deal on the EU budget we brokered at the European Council in December specified that EU funding for research should be increased so that by 2013 the resources available are around 75% higher in real terms than in 2006. And at the informal summit at Hampton Court in October, which set a clear direction for how Europe should respond to the challenges of golablisation, EU Heads called for further work on R&D.;

A key priority was to make as much progress as possible on negotiations of the 7th Framework Programme (FP7) for supporting research and technological development. At the informal Competitiveness Council in July in Cardiff, there was broad consensus on the direction of the Commission's FP7 proposal and a clear recognition of the importance of timely adoption and negotiation of the Commission's Specific Programme proposals. At the Competitiveness Council in October there was a useful debate on key issues raised by the UK Presidency questionnaire on the Capacities and Ideas chapters of the Commission's proposal, notably the structure of the European Research Council, support for SMEs, research infrastructure, and evaluation and monitoring. Finally, at the Competitiveness Council in November, the UK Presidency and the Council secured agreement by a significant majority of Member States on a Partial General Approach (PGA) on FP7. The PGA is viewed as a major achievement that sends a clear signal about the importance of research to Europe's future and is crucial for keeping FP7 to the overall legislative timetable. It confirms agreement on some of the main principles behind FP7, notably the critical importance of improving Europe's research, technology transfer and innovation performance to enhance global competitiveness and to increase growth and employment. The PGA will now provide the Austrian Presidency with a firm foundation to take forward the negotiations on FP7.

The Competitiveness and Innovation Programme (CIP) will be a key mechanism for bridging the gap between research and business take-up by providing practical support to entrepreneurs, in particular high growth innovative SMEs, to take new innovations to the market place. The UK Presidency progress report on the CIP was also discussed at the Competitiveness Council in November. It set out a number of recommendations for addressing Member States' key concerns, for example regarding the relationship with FP7, the relationship with the structural funds, and the management and evaluation of CIP. We have worked closely with the incoming Austrian Presidency in taking forward this dossier and they believe that our report should clear the ground for them to focus on detailed textual amendments.

As part of the re-launched Lisbon economic reform process, many Member States have highlighted the importance of research and innovation to economic reform in their National Reform Programmes. These reform programmes must be underpinned by policies and initiatives at the national and regional level, but it is also crucial that Member States coordinate their policy-making and their initiatives and programmes so that the process of economic reform can be substantially faster. The UK Presidency has organised high-level meetings in recent months to allow Member States to share their experiences of preparing National Reform Programmes, to review the Open Method of Coordination (OMC) as applied to research and innovation policies and to consider the benefits and impact of coordinating national research and innovation programmes.

On this theme, the UK Presidency and the Commission jointly hosted a "Conference on coordination of national research programmes" in Manchester in October 2005. The objective was to evaluate recent initiatives to facilitate better coordination of Member States' national R&D; programmes and to look forward to new ways in which synergies between those programmes could be better exploited. During the conference debates, there was recognition of the many potential benefits of coordinating national programmes and of the success of the ERA-net scheme. The conference findings emphasised the need to increase the political visibility of the programme coordination dossier and ensure that Member States set priorities and define which national programmes should be coordinated.

The Commission has also recently provided renewed impetus to the work on research and innovation through its Communication "More Research and Innovation - Investing for Growth and Employment", which sets out a wide range of balanced yet concrete measures which recognise the importance of research and innovation to the economic reform process. At the Competitiveness Council in November, Council Conclusions on this Communication were adopted. The Conclusions welcomed the Commission's new integrated approach to research and innovation and recognised the need for a coherent approach at the European and national level.

Although we made excellent progress during the UK presidency, many challenges still remain. I wish my Austrian collegues every success in tackling them. I know they will do a very good job and I look forward to working with them.

Lord SAINSBURY