EU Internal Market Commissioner, Thierry Breton, showed some optimism about the evolution of the budget for the European Defence Fund and the EU Space Programme during an exchange with MEPs on the Committee for Industry, Research and Energy (ITRE) on Thursday 4 June.
Many MEPs were concerned about some of the trade-offs made by the European Commission in the new version of the Multiannual Financial Framework (see EUROPE 12498/16), which they believe would undermine the strategic autonomy of the European Union.
These include the reduction in the European Defence Fund, cited by Zdzisław Krasnodębski (ECR, Poland), which is to be endowed with €9 billion (current prices) compared with €13 billion (current prices) in the Commission's proposals of May 2018, and the allocation for the Space Programme, mentioned by Massimiliano Salini (EPP, Italy), rapporteur for the text (see EUROPE 12203/11), which has fallen to €14.8 billion (current prices) compared with €16 billion (current prices).
Mr Breton acknowledged that while the Commission's new proposals fell short of the May 2018 proposals, they were better than the proposals of the Finnish EU Council Presidency, which had proposed €7 billion for the European Defence Fund (see EUROPE 12409/8).
“I felt it was not enough; we went up to 9 billion euros: it's better, but I would like us to do more and there, it is our work together than can lead to increasing this fund”, he told Krasnodębski. As for the EU space programme, “we are going up, we are soon at the budget we were hoping for, even if it is not yet exactly the budget we wanted, but we will continue to increase it, because it is an essential issue”.
The Commissioner hammered home a message: the European Commission's approach was not purely “monetary or financial”, unlike that of other regions of the world, he said, but focused on industry first. “We started from the industry to put together these plans: it was a first for the Commission and, believe me, it was not completely simple, because the habits were not there”.
Low-altitude satellite constellation. Responding to MEP Christophe Grudler (Renew Europe, France), the Commissioner confirmed that he wanted to develop the hydrogen sector in Europe, but also the principle of internet by low Earth orbit satellites. “I hope we can launch an autonomous European project on both subjects”, he said.
Conditions. The Commissioner also sought to reassure MEPs, such as Marc Botenga (GUE/NGL, Belgium) and Michael Bloss (Greens/EFA, Germany), about the conditions for ring-fencing, stressing that the European Commission will ensure that its triptych “greening, digitisation and resilience” is respected. For this, he said that it would be a good thing to ensure that certain companies did not pay dividends during the period of intervention of the aid. (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)