Brussels, 27/03/2013 (Agence Europe) - On Wednesday 27 March, the European Commission announced that an extra €11.2 billion is required for the EU budget if it is going to be able to reimburse beneficiaries of EU funded programmes completed across Europe in 2012, as well as honour cohesion policy claims for 2013. The European Commission has adopted a draft-amending budget that will enable the EU (if it is approved in its entirety by the Council and Parliament) to honour all the unpaid contractual obligations up to the end of 2012 and those of 2013. This draft budget relates to payments to recipients of European funding, and includes estimates from member states for payments they expect from the EU this year.
“This cannot come as a surprise”, said the Commissioner for Financial Planning and Budget, Janusz Lewandowski, who added that, “in recent years, voted EU budgets have been increasingly below the real needs based on estimates from member states; this is creating a snowballing effect of unpaid claims transferred onto the following year… I am confident that the Council and the Parliament will deliver on their commitments to avoid any shortfall in payments and take a swift decision on this proposal”.
The draft-amending budget comes to €11.2 billion, whereas outstanding invoices stand at €16 billion. The Commission, however, cannot claim more than €11.2 billion because this would exceed the ceiling set out in the financial framework. Exceeding this ceiling would require unanimous agreement from EU countries and would be impossible to obtain in the current context of budgetary austerity. This draft-amending budget consists of €9 billion in payments for cohesion policy (including €2 billion from Cohesion Funds and €2.2 billion to cover the requirements in other budget columns - no request for additional funds relates to the administration column). Research programmes need 643.7 million. €126 million will go to “Lifelong Learning” and Erasmus programmes and €460 million is also needed for rural development. The draft-amending budget also includes an increase in revenue of €290 million from fines.
The 2013 budget was established at €132.8 billion, €5 billion less than advocated by the Commission and €2.9 billion less than the payments made in 2012. This created a shortfall in financial resources earlier than it occurred the previous year.
United Kingdom believes Commission request is unacceptable
Greg Clark, Financial Secretary to the Treasury, has said that “this is a totally unacceptable request from the Commission at a time when most EU member states are taking difficult decisions to reduce public spending”. He also said that “it is extraordinary that the Commission should demand an increase in the EU budget that is bigger than the rescue package that was agreed for Cyprus earlier this week”.
Too little according to EP
The EP considers that the figure of €16 billion should figure in the amending budget because that is the amount that still needs to be paid in invoices and which corresponds to requests from member states. The EU rapporteur on the budget, Giovanni La Via (EPP, Italy), said that the €11.2 billion “is not enough, this can only be a first step and more payments will be needed to properly implement the 2013 budget”. Alain Lamassoure, Chairman of the European Parliament Budgets Committee warned that confirmation has come that “the European Union is at risk of finding itself in payment default before the end of 2013. The EU Treaty forbids it. The Parliament won't accept it. At a time when the EU is suffering from a credibility deficit, no one would take us seriously if we were to decide on the budget for the next seven years without being able to pay the bills for the current year”. (LC/transl.fl)