Brussels, 26/02/2014 (Agence Europe) - After 18 months of intense negotiations, representatives from the three EU institutions (the Council, the European Parliament and the European Commission) have reached an agreement to increase the visibility, recognition, effectiveness, transparency and accountability of European political parties. The agreement on a proposal for a regulation on the status and funding of European political parties and European political foundations still needs to be approved by Coreper on 5 March. The Council and Parliament will then have to ratify the new regulation, which will come into force in early 2017 - in other words, after the European elections at the end of May.
Under current legislation, European political parties and their affiliated foundations do not enjoy a uniform legal status based on EU law. Instead, different legal forms exist according to the country in which the party or foundation has its headquarters.
The proposal aims to provide European-level legal status for these bodies. In the future, registration under this status with the European Parliament will be a pre-condition for obtaining relevant funding from the EU budget. In 2013, these bodies received nearly €34 million from the EU budget.
Political parties and foundations wanting to take advantage of this EU legal status will have to respect certain criteria - especially European values. This status will be granted by an independent authority having its seat in the European Parliament. It will have to check on a regular basis that the conditions are still being respected. Should there be any breach of these conditions, this authority will be able to remove the legal status, after obtaining the opinion of a committee of independent people and on condition that neither the Council nor the Parliament oppose it. Financial penalties can be applied.
European political parties will have to publish the names of donors who contribute over €3,000 per year. The annual limit for private donations will increase from €12,000 to €18,000.
The regulation contains rules on the funding of these bodies (three sources of funding: EU budget, donations and contributions from political party members). “This ambitious agreement is an important step towards consolidating European democracy”, said European Commissioner for Interinstitutional Relations and Administration Maros Sefcovic, who is responsible for this issue. (LC)