To ask the Minister of State, Department for Constitutional Affairs what the legal base is for budgeted EU expenditure of €5,536,000 in 2007 for the Fundamental Rights Agency. (111299)

The legal base of the regulation establishing the Fundamental Rights Agency is article 308 of the treaty establishing the European Community. The existing European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia (EUMC) has an annual budget of €8.2 million. The Fundamental Rights Agency will have a mandate significantly wider than that of the EUMC and, for this reason, its budget has been set at €16 million in 2007 rising to €29 million in 2013.