P

Partnership
This is one of five principles for EU funding by Structural Funds. it refers to a multi-level co-operation between the regional and local authorities, the economic and social partners and other interested bodies and should involve all the partners at all stage, starting with the approval of the development plan.

Petersbergs tasks
These tasks were established 1992. The Members of Western European Union (WEU) declared their readiness to make military units available and defined the instances in which these forces can be used. These tasks are now included in the Treaty of the European Union and are an integrated part of the Eurpean Security and Defence Policy.

Pillars of the EU
The European Union makes decisions in three separate "domains" (policy areas), also known as the three "pillars" of the EU. The first pillar is the "Community domain", covering most of the common policies, where decisions are made by the "Community method" (see above) – involving the Commission, Parliament and the Council.The second pillar is the Common Foreign and Security Policy, where decisions are made by the Council alone.The third pillar is "police and judicial cooperation in criminal matters", where – once again – the Council makes the decisions.Within the first pillar, the Council normally makes the decisions by "qualified majority" vote. In the other pillars, the Council decision has to be unanimous: it can therefore be blocked by the veto of any one country. If the Council so decides, it can use the "Community bridge" to transfer certain matters from the third to the first pillar.

Pilot action
This is an experimental action on a small scale, a test before it is introduced on a large scale.

Potential impact
This is the description of the impact of the proposed action in the area concerned. It describes the exploitation and/or dissemination plans and show that they are adequate to ensure optimal use of the project results, where possible, beyond the participants in the Co-ordination action. Furthermore it describes the added-value in carrying out the work at an European level, indicating to what extent the new action will impact the existing national and international research activitites.

Pre-accession Funds
During the period 2000-2006 there is three pre-accession instrument available to candidate countries in order to prepare them for the accession and future use of structural and/or cohesion funds. They were PHARE, ISPA and SAPARD. They will be replaced by a single instrument from 2007, IPA, the Iinstrument for Pre-Accession.

Pre-Lex
This is a database on inter-institutional decision-making processes. It provides information on the diffrent stages of the procedure, the decisions of the institutions, the names of persons responsible and department and gives the document references

Principles of the Structural Funds
There are five principles for EU funding by the Structural Funds and by the Cohesion Fund; additionality, partnership, concentration, programming and monitoring.

Programming
A principle for EU funding by Structural Funds which involves the preparation of multiannual development plans and is undertaken through a partnership-based decision-making process meaning that the programmes should be multi-annual and multi-tasked.