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Current Position and Next Steps

On 30 July the European Commission approved the UK’s National Strategic Reference Framework (NSRF) for Structural Funds spending from 2007-2013.

As part of the Commission’s new Regulations, Managing Authorities and regions are required to develop individual Operational Programmes setting out their detailed spending plans for the Funds for the current period. These Programmes were the subject of public consultations, which ran between autumn 2006 and spring 2007.

All of the Operational Programmes Programme have now been submitted to the European Commission and are at various stages of the approval process.

The European Commission have launched a public consultation on the future of EU Cohesion Policy. The UK Government has outlined its approach to the consultation in a written statement to Parliament. As noted in the written statement the consultation on the future of Cohesion Policy needs to be considered in the context of the EC Budget Review. Ed Ball’s in his speech to the Institute of Chartered Accountants on the 20 November 2006 outlined UK Government’s approach to this Review.