Full breakdown of costs for ‘outstanding initiative’ awards and other Commission-funded prizes
9.11.2020
Question for written answer E-006078/2020
to the Commission
Rule 138
Charlie Weimers (ECR), Derk Jan Eppink (ECR), Joachim Kuhs (ID), Hermann Tertsch (ECR), Cristian Terheş (ECR)
Every year, the Commission awards a plethora of prizes and awards[1]. Among these are the annual prizes for ‘outstanding initiatives’ that receive funding under EU programmes. Many award recipients are businesses, organisations or individuals that have already received taxpayer subsidies. Reasons for awarding these prizes include the need to raise awareness of EU funding programmes and the benefits these bring to people in the EU[2].
On 15 October 2020, the Commission announced the winners of the Natura 2000 Award and the Stars4Media outstanding initiative prizes[3]. Natura 2000 is an EU-funded network of conservation areas. Stars4Media is a pilot project created by a Brussels-based media group and is led by a Brussels university. It receives 80 % of its funding from the Commission[4].
This year, the Stars4Media Diversity Prize was awarded to ‘Black City Stories’ – an initiative ‘committed to investigating in-depth Black Lived Experiences, breaking down the systems and contexts of structural racism’.
- 1.Can the Commission provide a full breakdown of the costs of these award ceremonies and the prize sum of every prize that has been awarded over the past five years?
- 2.Can it provide a full breakdown of the prizes to be awarded either by the Commission or by a Commission-funded organisation such as Stars4Media?
- [1] For example, see the architecture awards: https://ec.europa.eu/programmes/creative-europe/actions/architecture-prize_en
- [2] https://cor.europa.eu/en/news/Pages/European-Natura-2000-Award.aspx
- [3] https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/MEX_20_1919
- [4] https://europemedialab.eu/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/Stars4Media-FAQ.pdf