On Wednesday 24 January, the budgets committee (BUDG) of the European Parliament welcomed the draft 'Olbrycht/Thomas' and 'Deprez/Lewandowski' reports on the post-2020 multiannual financial framework (MFF) (see EUROPE 11944).
José Manuel Fernandes (EPP, Portugal) congratulated the MEPs on their “excellent work, which shows that Parliament is united” ahead of the forthcoming battle of the financial perspectives. “Brexit should not reduce the ambition of the Twenty-Seven”, he said. Helga Trüpel (Greens/EFA, Germany), whose third set of negotiations on the MFF this is, predicted tougher talks than the last two, as the conflict between net contributor and net beneficiary countries has worsened since 2013.
Jan Olbrycht (EPP, Poland) stressed that his draft report calls for an EU budget of 1.3% of gross national income (GNI), whilst the Commission is proposing 1.1%. Isabelle Thomas (S&D, France) considers that one last seven-year programming period is acceptable before moving to a ten-year cycle (two periods of five years with a compulsory mid-term review).
The MEPs, who will seek to define their position in March, will find an ally in the European Commission. The Commissioner for the Budget, Günther Oettinger, said that he would try to take account of their expectations “as much as possible” in the proposal to be presented by the Commission in May. He reiterated the areas in which the Commission is working to manage the withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the EU and finance new (security, migration) or reaffirmed (cohesion, research and innovation) political priorities.
50% of the €12 billion financial gap linked to Brexit could be plugged through savings and fresh money, whilst the new priorities could be 80% covered by fresh money and 20% by budgetary redeployments (see EUROPE 11934 and 11935).
By allocating more resources to border controls, it will then be possible to better reorganise the freedom of movement within the 27, the Commissioner went on to say.
Own resources. The MEPs hope to establish a political link between defining the future post-2020 MFF and introducing new own resources, to allow national contributions to be cut by the same amount.
The MEPs' priority areas draw broad inspiration from the 'Monti' report, on which there is an inter-institutional agreement, noted Gérard Deprez (ALDE, Belgium). Against the backdrop of Brexit, he argued for the rebates enjoyed by certain member states to be abolished. Janusz Lewandowski (EPP, Poland) considers that the toughest task will be to establish an environmental tax to feed into the EU budget. This must be country-neutral, targeting no country in particular, or the proposal will be dead in the water, he warned.
The two co-rapporteurs call on the Commission to consider a carbon tax on the borders, to protect the EU from imports of products from countries with no greenhouse gas pricing mechanism.
Creating new own resources to feed into the EU budget is leading to more and more objections, Oettinger observed. He put the question of taxing plastic back on the table and bounced off the possibility of taxing the Internet giants, as called for by France. On this point, it will not be easy to identify added value produced in the EU.
On all of these elements, the Commissioner hopes for a “clear signal” to be sent out by the informal European summit that will discuss the post-2020 MFF on Friday 23 February. (Original version in French by Mathieu Bion)