Strasbourg, 22/10/2013 (Agence Europe) - The European Parliament, finding itself backed into a corner, will, on Thursday 24 October, probably approve the €2.7 billion which will narrowly avoid payment default by the European Commission. The Parliament, however, is deeply unhappy at how the Commission and the Council have engineered things to ensure Parliament approval.
On Tuesday afternoon, the Parliament budgets committee approved draft amending budget No 8 for 2013 which relates to revenue: a drop of €3.9 billion from traditional own resources forecasts and of €384 million from VAT-based own resources, partially offset by fines totalling €1.2 million. This results automatically in an increase in additional GNI contributions from the member states of €3.1 billion, that is, a net increase in national contributions of €2.7 billion. Parliament will vote on this amending budget on Thursday.
The budgets committee picked up the pace after the previous day's announcement by the European Commission of imminent liquidity shortage (by mid-November).
The adoption of a €3.9 billion amending budget (No 8 for 2013, relating to outstanding payments to be honoured) having been postponed to the November plenary, the Commission stood on the brink of being broke. In order to be able to survive until the €3.9 billion is approved, it was imperative, according to the Commission, that fresh resources be made available.
In the Parliament, that is not the reading being put on things, especially as approval of the €3.9 billion is one of the conditions for approval of the multiannual financial framework (MFF) 2014-2020. MEPs are at a loss to understand the suddenness of the payment default announcement, when amending budget No 8 was negotiated in trialogue last week. “I fail to understand”, said EPP leader Joseph Daul, “how there can be no problem all week then yesterday morning the European Commission talks about suspension of payments. If there is a problem, it's that people didn't do their jobs.” “If this had been in any company, heads would have rolled”, he added. He intends to call for sanctions against those who failed to keep on top of matters. The joint leader of the Greens, Daniel Cohn-Bendit, suspects that “what lies behind this, is an attempt to find a solution on the €2.7 billion without paying the €3.9 billion arrears, that we say, 'yes, yes' and that we forget them”. He warned against built-up deficits that could push up the bill to €20 billion from the day the 2014-2020 MFF, which has already been reduced, comes into force. “We need to stop playing Monopoly”, he said. (MD/transl.fl)