UN: EU Statement on United Nations Common System

UN 61st Session; Fifth Committee, Agenda Item 125: United Nations Common System, New York, 25 October 2006

Statement by Ms. Katja Pehrman, First Secretary, Permanent Mission of Finland to the United Nations, on behalf of the European Union

Mr. Chairman,

I have the honour to speak on behalf of the European Union.

The Acceding Countries Bulgaria and Romania, the Candidate Countries Turkey, Croatia* and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia*, the Countries of the Stabilisation and Association Process and potential candidates Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Serbia and the EFTA countries Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway, members of the European Economic Area, as well as the Republic of Moldova align themselves with this declaration.

*) Croatia and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia continue to be part of the Stabilisation and Association Process.

At the outset let me thank the Chairman of the International Civil Service Commission, Mr. Mohsen Bel Hadj Amor for the presentation of the ICSC report A/61/30. We would also like to thank the representatives of the Secretariat for their comments, Ms. Katrina Nowlan and Mr. Kenneth Herman as well as the President of the Federation of International Civil Servants’ Associations (FICSA), Mr. Robert Weissel. Furthermore we wish to extend our thanks to the Chairman of the Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions, Mr. Rajat Saha, for his comments.

Mr. Chairman,

Under the present agenda item (117), the UN Common System, we are in a somewhat unusual situation in that we have a great number of reports in front of us, some of which have been introduced to the Fifth Committee already two years ago during the 59th session.

The reason for this is that we have not been able to take action on the report of the Panel on Strengthening of the International Civil Service and on the related comments of the ICSC and of the Secretary-General and the United Nations Chief Executives Board for Coordination. Together with the heavy workload the Fifth Committee saw itself confronted with in the 60th session, this has also prevented us from taking action on the Report of the ICSC for the year 2005.

This situation might complicate our deliberations as we need to consider many interrelating issues. In this context I would like to thank the ICSC for its effort to facilitate our work by presenting in the 2006 report an overview of recommendations and decisions of both the 2005 and the 2006 report.

Mr. Chairman,

The Common System is, like so many things in the United Nations, unique. And in this system the ICSC has a unique role to play in the centre of the triangle formed by member states, management and staff. We all depend heavily on the expertise and the communicative and negotiation skills of the ICSC to guide us in making decisions satisfying the sometimes very different interests. If the ICSC fails to address the needs of staff, management or Member States and fails to find a proper balance between those, the work of the Organisation will be seriously hampered, which in turn will not benefit us. In our view the ICSC and its secretariat should be the centre of knowledge and expertise, guiding multilateral organisations inside and outside of the UN system on Human Resource Management issues.

It is with this important, even crucial, role of the ICSC in mind that the EU welcomed the report of the Panel. The recommendations of the Panel provide a good basis to strengthen the ICSC, with the ones on the consultative process, the greater use of working groups, the selection of candidates, the introduction of term-limits and the duration of the sessions are relevant – even if the exact modalities are subject to discussions.

Mr. Chairman,

In its 2005 and 2006 reports the ICSC addresses many issues and makes many important recommendations. Some of the topics are rather straightforward and will most probably give little problems, but others are more complex, needing more time to digest. And some issues are so interlinked, like the harmonisation of conditions of service, the contractual arrangements, the survey of gender balance and the discussion on Human Resource Management that these might better be taken up under that latter agenda item.

The EU has been following with interest the developments of the pilot study and looks forward to hearing more in the informals about progress made and difficulties encountered. As for the financial implications, reflected in the report of the SG and of the ACABQ, the EU will use the Q&A session to obtain additional information.

Mr. Chairman,

In the 60th session the Fifth Committee did spend a considerable amount of time on the ICSC. Many questions were asked and answered and we had a very interesting conference with one of the members of the panel. Both in December 2005 and in March 2006 we worked on draft resolutions with language from all delegations of the Fifth Committee. The EU intends to build upon the work done before and strives to resolve as many issues as possible before the end of the main session. We owe this to the Staff – the most important asset of the Organisation, as we like to stress time and again, to the Management and in the end to ourselves.

Please be assured of our constructive approach to the negotiations.

Thank you.