The European Parliament,

–   having regard to Articles 266 and 267 of the EC Treaty establishing the European Investment Bank (EIB) and the Protocol on the Statute of the European Investment Bank annexed to the treaty,

–   having regard to the decision of its Conference of Presidents of 15 May 1996 to hold an annual debate on the lending priorities, annual report and general orientation of the EIB under the auspices of the committee responsible,

–   having regard to the activity report for 2003 of the EIB Group, the corporate operational plan for 2004-2006 of the EIB Group, the annual report for 2003 of the European Investment Fund (EIF), the report of the Audit Committee for the 2003 financial year, the replies of the management committee and the hearing of the President of the EIB by the committee responsible on 23 November 2004,

–   having regard to the statement of 2 June 2004 on governance at the EIB,

–   having regard to the comments made in the Court of Auditors' annual report for 2003,

–   having regard to the Commission/EIB cooperation agreement of January 2000,

–   having regard to the presidency conclusions of the Lisbon European Council of 23 and 24 March 2000, the Gothenburg European Council of 15 and 16 June 2001 and the Brussels European Council of 12 and 13 December 2003,

–   having regard to its resolution of 22 April 2004 on the European Investment Bank's activity report for 2002(1),

–   having regard to Rules 112(2) and 45 of its Rules of Procedure,

–   having regard to the report of its Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs (A6-0032/2005),

A.   whereas the EIB is a public bank established by the EC Treaty as a privileged financial institution to achieve the European Union's objectives by investing in projects and acting as a catalyst for such investment, and the Lisbon and Gothenburg European Councils reaffirmed the contribution made by the EIB to the achievement of those objectives; whereas the aforesaid European Councils set out the broad lines of those objectives, namely an economy the competitiveness of which is based on knowledge and social cohesion, complying with local and world-wide environmental restrictions,

B.   whereas, on the occasion of those European Councils, the European Union set itself the objective of becoming the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world, in which sustainable economic growth leads to more and better jobs, firmer social cohesion and compliance with environmental constraints; whereas that objective requires a considerable amount of investment; whereas the importance of the EIB's role is recognised, particularly in relation to the implementation of the 'Growth Initiative'; whereas the European Parliament has also stressed the particular importance of own-resources funding for venture capital, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and human capital,

C.   whereas there are substantial differences with regard to the demand for and the granting of credits to SMEs in the various Member States,

D.   whereas the loans granted in 2003 totalled EUR 46.6 billion, comprising EUR 37.3 billion for Member States (80%), EUR 5.7 billion for acceding and accession countries and EUR 3.6 billion for partner countries, including EUR 2.1 billion for the countries of the Euro-Mediteranean partnership and EUR 0.5 billion for ACP States and OCT, with around 40% of these loans being provided through intermediary banks,

E.   whereas the important position occupied by the EIB in the European Union's institutional framework and the large volume of funds which it manages or for which it acts as a catalyst, some of which are provided under the Union's budget, suffice to justify the EIB's continuing dialogue with the European Parliament, the Council and the Commission, as well as the scrutiny exercised by the Court of Auditors (where European Union funds are involved) and the European Anti-Fraud Office,

F.   whereas the EIB plays an important role and has a multiplier effect on mobilising other sources of funding, encouraging the involvement of the private sector and risk sharing, particularly by means of risk capital instruments and the granting of guarantees,

1.  Congratulates the EIB on its activity report for 2003 and the general improvement in the transparency of the information made available to the public, and welcomes the good relations established with the EIB;

Objectives

2.  Calls on the EIB to actively continue to support the implementation of the strategy formulated by the Lisbon and Gothenburg European Councils, particularly through its "Innovation 2010" initiative, and the Growth initiative, by funding infrastructure programmes and research and development projects and by acting as a catalyst for public and private investment; suggests that the EIB collaborate more closely with the Commission and the European Central Bank with a view to laying down prudential rules to enable the corresponding loans to be provided without compromising the sustainability of the Member States" public debt;

3.  Encourages the EIB to prioritise the funding of the Trans-European Networks; supports the EIB's decision to invest more in the renewable energy sector and to make greenhouse gas emissions prevention an essential criterion in the selection of projects to be supported;

4.  Congratulates the EIB for further developing the loans available to small businesses; calls on the EIB to pay attention also to the social economy and "locally-oriented services" sector which, in view of current demographic trends, plays a very important role in ensuring optimum levels of participation in working life and of social cohesion;

5.  Calls on the EIB to improve the granting of loans to SMEs in those Member States which are lagging behind as far as EIB loans are concerned in order to diminish the substantial differences between Member States;

6.  Draws attention to the UN's International Year of Microcredit, and encourages the EIB to include this in its 2005 programming;

7.  Urges the EIB to adopt a precise set of rules defining the quantitative assessment criteria for projects submitted to it, and the systematic examination of the results obtained, so as to assess the real contribution made to the Lisbon strategy;

8.  Acknowledges the economic and social impact achieved by the EIB's activities on the growth of SMEs and on employment; calls, however, on the EIB to increase that impact by improving the administrative structures for SME access to risk capital, and by encouraging access to its activities on the part of local and regional financial partners;

Criteria and assessment

9.  Congratulates the EIB for the progress made in recent years towards greater selectivity with regard to projects to be supported in the context of the European Union's objectives; urges it to clarify its selection criteria and to rigorously assess results in the light of objectives;

10.  Calls urgently for the heavy administrative burdens imposed on SMEs and banks to be reduced, so that they can benefit more from EIF capital; calls for particular attention to be paid to the Innovation 2010 Initiative and for the threshold for projects to be lowered in this respect;

11.  Acknowledges the EIB's wish to contribute to the Lisbon strategy, highlights the significant role played by the EIF via the Innovation 2010 Initiative and invites the EIB to consolidate its role as a financial driving force for modernising the European Union, particularly by means of support for scientific research and, in particular, support for high-technology industries;

12.  Calls on the EIB, when taking action outside the European Union, to clarify the criteria governing such action beyond the very general brief given by the Commission, taking as a basis the European Parliament's recommendations concerning cooperation and the recommendations of the World Bank and other development banks;

13.  Supports the EIB's efforts to ensure the best possible coordination with the Commission through a Joint Working Group; suggests that this coordination be formalised and extended to include the European Parliament itself;

14.  Calls on the EIB to carry out a fuller enquiry into the real contribution made by European Union and EIB investment to regional development and to establish appropriate indicators, as recommended by its own operations evaluation department;

15.  Recommends that the EIB continue to establish more clearly the criteria for the final destination of its global loans, and calls on the EIB to establish a transparent procedure to check and evaluate the way in which they are used by the intermediary banks, particularly with a view to checking that the ultimate beneficiaries do in fact benefit from the advantageous nature of loans provided by the EIB; is of the opinion that the EIB should play an active role in monitoring and, where necessary, improving the promotion and granting of global loans;

16.  Calls on the Court of Auditors to ensure that the conditions attached to loans granted by the EIB, and the subsidies it is mandated to allocate to various projects, do not lead to certain recipients indirectly benefiting from undue subsidies when they could obtain funding from the market; urges the EIB to give the Court of Auditors full access to the necessary information to this end, including, where appropriate, commercial information of a confidential or market-sensitive nature;

Transparency and accountability

17.  Congratulates the EIB on the progress achieved in its dialogue with the public and with non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and on the publication of its reports on the environment and on the social impact assessment of EIB projects in developing countries;

18.  Recommends the development of a special information campaign on the activities of the EIB for SMEs in the new Member States;

19.  Warmly endorses the proposals on transparency adopted on 15 June 2004 by the Board of Directors; intends to participate actively in the consultation procedure envisaged in this report, in connection with the implementation of the UN Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters (Aarhus Convention); stresses the importance of taking into account the requests made, in the course of this consultation procedure, by the institutions and NGOs;

20.  Considers that greater attention should be paid to improving the auditing to which the EIB is subject, in accordance with the recommendations of the annual reports of the Audit Committee and the recommendations of the operations evaluation department; believes that the European Parliament should be involved in that process;

21.  Welcomes, in view of the recurrent allegations appearing in the press concerning possible conflicts of interest involving senior EIB management staff, the clarification provided by the EIB on this matter following the adoption of the above-mentioned report A6-0032/2005; welcomes with satisfaction the governance-related amendments made to the EIB's Statute and Rules of Procedure since 1 May 2004 in connection with enlargement of the European Union to include 10 new Member States; endorses the posting, on the EIB's website, of all codes of conduct applicable to EIB decision-taking bodies;

22.  Calls on the EIB to continue to provide the European Parliament and the public, every year, with a summary of the action undertaken to improve the way in which it operates, in accordance with its timely abovementioned resolution of 22 April 2004; acknowledges, in the meantime, the need to continue investigating what means should be used to improve the prudential control of the EIB, as regards both the use of its own funds, and the funds allocated to it by the European Union budget;

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23.  Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Council, the Commission and the EIB.

(1) Texts Adopted, P5_TA(2004)0371.