The Official Journal of the European Union, OJEU, has published on December, 30th, 2008, Decisions Nº 1357/2008/CE and Nº 1358/2008/CE of the European Parliament and of the Council of December, 16th, respectively amending Decision Nº 1720/2006/EC establishing the Action Programme in the field of Lifelong Learning and Decision Nº 1904/2006/EC establishing the “Europe for Citizens” Programme for the period 2007 to 2013.

Some procedural requirements established for the administration of the Action Programme in the field of Lifelong Learning and the “Europe for Citizens” Programme for the period 2007 to 2013, have proved to be adding two to three months to the process of awarding grants to applicants.

These procedures were causing many delays for recipients, placing a disproportionate burden on the programme’s administration and providing no added value given the nature of the grants awarded.

For that reason, the European Parliament and the Council jointly decided to simplify some aspects regarding those procedures in order to enable that some selection decisions, especially those related to small grants and which do not involve any politically sensitive decision making, will not have to be subject to the advisory procedure and to the European Parliament's right of scrutiny.

In order to allow selection decisions to be implemented more quickly and efficiently, it has been considered necessary to replace the advisory procedure with an obligation on the Commission to inform the European Parliament and the Member States without delay about any measures taken for the implementation of such Programmes.

For that purpose, the Commission will be obliged to inform, within two working days of the adoption of the decisions taken for the implementation of the Programmes. This information will include descriptions and an analysis of the applications received, a description of the assessment and selection procedure, and lists of both the projects proposed for funding and those rejected.