Brussels, 04/03/2010 (Agence Europe) - At a meeting of the European Parliament's budgets committee on Thursday 4 March, the director general of DG Budget at the European Commission, Hervé Jouanjean, said that the Commission is planning to unveil in July or September this year a report on reforming the budget and changing the EU - a leaked initial draft of which has generated a raft of criticism (see EUROPE 10018). Copying what it did last year, the Commission has decided to postpone adoption of this report on the mid-term review of the EU budget. The Commission hopes that the new draft legislation required to set up an EU diplomatic service will be unveiled on 11 March and the following weeks.
The DG Budget director general has given some indications as to the Commission's scheduling for the new draft legislation this year on the budget and financial management in general. On 28 April, the Commission will unveil the draft EU budget for 2011 along with a report (together with draft legislation, where required) assessing how the current financial framework (2007-2013) is operating and the 2006 inter-institutional agreement on budget discipline and sound financial management.
In the second fortnight of May, the Commission will publish “very substantial” draft legislation reviewing the financial regulation and because this amounts to evaluation of the EU budget, the said document (an initial, incomplete. version of which was leaked last November, added Hervé Jouanjean) will be published by the Commission in July or September 2010. In the autumn, the Commission will publish a report on acceptable risk of errors.
On 11 March, the Commission will publish draft amendments to the financial regulation and draft adjustments of the EU civil servants' terms and conditions to prepare for creation of the EU diplomatic corps. Hervé Jouanjean said that in the following weeks, the Commission would publish a draft amending budget to deal with the impact of setting up the diplomatic corps. He said the Commission was working closely with EU High Representative Catherine Ashton on the issue and a lot of progress had been made. He said the European Commission was anxious to move quickly, as was Ashton because she needs a draft budget to speed up creation of the diplomatic corps. The Commission hopes to publish the draft budget in the next few weeks, added Hervé Jouanjean.
Reimer Böge (EPP, Germany) criticised the Commission for its silence over the Lisboan Treaty's impact on EU finances in connection with the mid-term review of multi-annual programmes. Several MEPs expressed concern that there was no room for manœuvre in the 2011, 2012 and 2013 versions of the budget. Göran Färm (S&D, Sweden) wanted to know when the European Commission was going to publish changes to the financial perspectives.
Salvador Garriga Polledo (EPP, Spain) wanted details about the mid-term review of the EU budget because the review document and the review itself would be important for preparing the 2011 budget but also to feed the debate within the EP's political parties about the European Commission's suggestions on funding for targets set out in the new EU 2020 strategy. He severely criticised the late publication of the mid-term review and urged the Commission to keep its promises.
Helga Trüpel (Greens/EFA, Germany) said the Commission was not playing its part and not initiating policy. She said that things needed to change and the Commission should have published a draft mid-term review of the EU budget back in 2009 rather than leaving it until this year. She said she feared that publication would be postponed even later once the negotiations get going in 2011 on the post-2013 financial perspectives. (L.C/transl fl)