This week, Minister Howlin is travelling to France to attend The Paris Conference: from Open Data to Open Government.
The Open Government Partnership (OGP) is a multilateral initiative that aims to secure concrete commitments from governments to promote transparency, empower citizens, fight corruption, and harness new technologies to strengthen governance. It is overseen by a multi‐stakeholder International Steering Committee involving Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico, Norway, Philippines, South Africa, Tanzania, the United Kingdom and the United States, as well as civil society organisations. More information on the conference can be found here.
The Minister will then travel to Athens to attend the Informal Ministerial Meeting on Cohesion Policy in Athens. Cohesion funding is the EU’s principle investment tool for delivering the Europe 2020 goals: creating growth and jobs, tackling climate change and energy dependence, and reducing poverty and social exclusion.
In the context of the agreement on the EU’s Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) which was reached during Ireland’s Presidency of the EU Council of Ministers, the Irish Government was successful in securing €1.2billion of Cohesion policy funding for the period 2014-2020. This represents an increase of 8% in real terms over the 2007-2013 programming period, against the background of an overall reduction of 8% in the overall EU budget for Cohesion policy. This includes special allocations for the BMW Region and the Northern Ireland PEACE Programme.
Of this €1.2 billion, some €951 million is for European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and European Social Fund (ESF) co-funded programmes in Ireland, with the balance being devoted to European Territorial Cooperation (ETC) programmes, including, the Northern Ireland PEACE Programme, the Ireland/Northern Ireland/West of Scotland INTERREG Programme, the Ireland/Wales INTERREG Programme and a number of smaller transnational programmes in which Ireland participates. This week the Government approved the submission of Ireland’s draft Partnership Agreement for the next programming period to the Commission.
You’ll find more information on the Informal Meeting here.

