MEPs Jan Olbrycht (EPP, Poland) and Margarida Marques (S&D, Portugal) submitted a draft report on Tuesday 17 March calling for an ‘emergency plan’ for the EU’s Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) for 2021-2027, given the delays in European Council negotiations on this very sensitive dossier (see EUROPE 12443/3).
The draft own-initiative report, which the Parliament’s Committee on Budgets hopes to adopt on 2 April if the timetable is not disrupted by the coronavirus pandemic, contains recommendations to the Commission on a “safety net to protect the beneficiaries of EU programmes”.
The draft resolution calls on the Commission to present such an emergency plan by 15 June 2020 to meet a twofold need: - ensure that the budgetary procedure for 2021 begins with all the necessary information concerning the contingency plan; - ensure that the relevant legislative proposals can be adopted by the co-legislators before the conciliation on the 2021 budget.
Extensions of the 2020 ceilings. That’s when the budgetary authority will have to take a final decision on the 2021 budget, either on the basis of a new 2021-2027 MFF or on the basis of an extension of the 2020 ceilings.
The measures necessary for the implementation of the contingency plan would be financed, according to the draft report, from the annual budget, within the ceilings of the MFF for 2020 and the flexibility provisions of the 2014-2020 MFF. Parliament is invoking the fourth paragraph of Article 312 of the Treaty: when the EU Council Regulation establishing a new MFF has not been adopted before the expiry of the previous framework, the ceilings and all other provisions corresponding to the last year of the framework shall be extended until the adoption of that act. Due to the United Kingdom’s withdrawal from the EU, this would lead to the disappearance of rebates. To read the draft report: http://bit.ly/2UkFMU2 (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)