Submission Form for a Written Statement to be presented orally during the first session of the Director General’s Consultation on the Draft Programme and Budget for 2010-2011 (35C/5) of National Commissions for UNESCO in Europe and North America All National Commissions of the region are invited to present their opinion on UNESCO’s programme and budget for 2010-2011 (35C/5), concerning themes, programmes, financial matters, procedures, decentralization, One UN, intersectoral platforms and other items, in an oral statement of no longer than 3 minutes, during the first session of the debate on the 35C/5. This oral statement should be put into writing (no longer than 350 words), and has to be sent to the three organizing Commissions no later than 19 May 2008. This written statement may be included as an appendix in the final report of the consultation.

WRITTEN STATEMENT United Kingdom National Commission for UNESCO Professor Alexander Boksenberg, Chair ___________________________________________________________________________

It is a great pleasure to contribute to this debate. We have already distributed our detailed written response to this year's questionnaire. Some will regard it as both radical and critical. I wanted to stress at the beginning that there are few greater supporters of the ideals and work of UNESCO than this National Commission. Since we were fully re-established some four years ago we have tried to be as active and effective as possible in helping prepare UNESCO to strengthen its efforts, reorganise itself and provide greater leadership in meeting the difficult and growing challenges that lie within its mandate. Some progress has been made but we feel that vital points are still being missed, and that UNESCO is far from achieving its true potential, far from meeting the ideals set out in its mandate, and far from making the impact it deserves to. UNESCO is unique in its efforts in the sectors for which it is responsible in that it brings together all the world's governments and many other partners. It is not simply one among many players. But it fails to exert the authority which such a position brings. Nor are its efforts deployed in the most effective ways. We have tried to strengthen its leadership role in EFA and UNESCO is moving in the right direction there, though the full results have yet to be seen. In EFA we have global objectives which UNESCO can monitor and get all of us to pursue. But in other sectors, and even for some of the educational field, we still lack such global objectives, we lack proper monitoring of what is going on and we lack a systematic approach to building capacity in countries which really need the help. Too many of UNESCO's interventions remain random, piecemeal and minor. Our fuller written contribution sets out this dilemma and how we think we should tackle it. It really proposes a radical strengthening of the Organisation's leadership role - and why we need to achieve this. And it discusses what we need to do in order to be able to deliver results on an altogether more useful level both at Headquarters and in-country. The questions it poses are fundamental and go to the heart of what UNESCO's business should be. We hope that it will form a useful input to our collective discussions over the next few days.