The MEP rapporteur on the EU’s 2021 budget, Pierre Larrouturou (S&D, France), told the press and while attending a meeting of the European Parliament’s Committee on Budgets on Wednesday 28 October that he was starting a “hunger strike” in Brussels to alert citizens to budget cuts in climate and health sectors and to push for an ambitious financial transaction tax (FTT).
“Today I am starting a hunger strike. I’m going to stay day and night at Parliament and stop eating. My goal is not to die, but to avoid millions of deaths”, he said.
He is taking this extreme step to expose the following scandal: “People are not aware of this, but we are moving towards a situation where there will be almost no money for climate, health, nothing serious for employment” in the next EU budget. The only solution, according to him, is to increase the EU’s own resources with a substantive financial transaction tax, which would make it possible to reimburse the Next Generation EU Recovery Plan, while at the same time financing health and climate. He hopes that the Ecofin Council will reach an agreement on this dossier on 1 December.
“If we don’t tax speculation, the European Green Deal is dead. All the talk about the Climate Law, and the creation of green jobs... will be nothing but empty words”, he explained. He estimated that the FTT, which would bring in “more than 50 billion euros” per year, could be implemented through ‘enhanced cooperation’ of Member States. With a nice “carrot” at the end of the day: “those who take part in it will not have to pay back the debt from the Recovery Plan” of the EU economy.
For several years, 10 Member States - Germany, France, Belgium, Portugal, Austria, Slovenia, Greece, Spain, Italy and Slovakia - have been trying to agree on an FTT (see EUROPE 12477/23).
Parliament, the EU Council and the European Commission hope to reach a compromise on the Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) 2021-2027 and the Recovery Plan soon (see separate news item). (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)