Invitation to submit a proposal for a grant - Twinning programme II involving safety experts of rail stakeholders under the Programme Support Action "Enhancing the cooper

The Multi Annual Work Programme 2014-2020 under the Connecting Europe Facility CEF gives the Commission the opportunity to launch a Programme Support Action in the field of "safe and secure infrastructure". This would be implemented by means of a grant to support a twinning programme for management staff of rail stakeholders with safety responsibility (Annex II § 4.2.2.1).

The objective of this Programme Support Action is the sharing of knowledge and best practice across railways to support new approaches to safety management.

The action, which continues the good results obtained by the first Twinning programme in 2016, through the creation of a consortium of EU/EFTA rail infrastructure managers, National Safety authorities, National Investigation bodies or Railway Undertakings with a team of central coordinator and the assistance of a managing entity (chosen by the consortium members) who will help them in agreeing mutually beneficial experts' exchanges. The coordinator will support the application for funding, and organise a conference for sharing best practices and learning at the end of the programme. At least 12 participant entities (including the coordinator) among the rail infrastructure managers, rail undertakings, national investigation bodies and national safety authorities have to participate to the twinning programme, which has to be launched beginning of 2020.

The twinning programme should result in a structured approach and a shared understanding of both the opportunities and benefits, and of the barriers to a more mature and fair safety culture, and reinforcing the practices for occurrence reporting in railways.

Annex 1 attached contains a detailed description of the activities to be funded under this action.

The coordinator should submit the request on behalf of the consortium using the enclosed application form (Annex 2) and its Annexes 2.1-2.5 (Budgetary Annex, Legal Entity Form, Bank Account Form, Declaration of Honour and Agreement of the Member State). The conditions for awarding grants (Annex 1) include the eligible activities, eligible costs, award criteria, etc. A model of the Grant Agreement and its Annexes I-V is also available in Annex 32. All documents will also be provided in electronic form upon request at MOVE-C4-TWINNING-PROGRAMMEec [dot] europa [dot] eu (MOVE-C4-TWINNING-PROGRAMME[at]ec[dot]europa[dot]eu)

Deadline for submission is November 15th, 2019 at the latest.

Your application will be evaluated by the Commission on the basis of the criteria established in Annex 1 to this letter (conditions for awarding grants). Should the Commission decide to offer you a grant such grant would be given on the basis of the model enclosed in Annex 3.

EFTA member states are eligible to participate in the action but they cannot receive any funding.

Should you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact MOVE-C4TWINNING-PROGRAMMEec [dot] europa [dot] eu (MOVE-C4TWINNING-PROGRAMME[at]ec[dot]europa[dot]eu)