On Friday 17 November, the member states and MEPs will attempt to reach an agreement on the draft EU budget, in the framework of a conciliation committee.
Unsurprisingly, the positions of the Council of the EU and of the Parliament over the budget continue to differ. A diplomat from a member state described the Council's position as “realistic” and that of the MEPs as “ambitious”, on Thursday 16 November.
At the end of October, the Estonian Presidency of the Council said that the member states could not accept the Parliament's wish to reverse all of the budgetary cuts that they had recommended (see EUROPE 11891). For their part, the MEPs do not see how the member states can otherwise hope to cover the future-facing expenditure to stimulate growth and tackle other political priorities, such as managing migration.
The member states consider that the EU's budget for 2018 should stand at €158.9 billion in commitment appropriations and €144.4 billion in payment appropriations, or an increase of 0.6% and 7.4% respectively on the 2017 budget (see EUROPE 11828). Parliament, on the other hand, is arguing for a 2018 EU budget of €162.6 billion in commitments and €146.7 billion in payments.
In any event, the 2017 budget will be higher than the following year, the same diplomat observed, declining to state whether the two institutions' positions had come closer together since the conciliation procedure launched. He quoted what he described as the “stunning figure” of €7.7 billion that reportedly corresponds to the non-consumption of budgetary credit in 2017. He went on to welcome the attitude of the United Kingdom, which has constantly played the game by respecting its commitments in all these discussions. “Brexit will be neither a factor nor a subject of the budgetary discussions”, he said.
No agreement is likely before the early hours of Saturday 18 November. If negotiations break down after the deadline of midnight on Monday 20 November, the European Commission will be obliged to present a new draft budget for 2018. (Original version in French by Mathieu Bion)