The representatives of the Portuguese presidency of the Council of the EU said on Thursday 7 January that the decisions required to put the economic recovery plan and the multiannual financial framework into effect need to be implemented before any potential new measures are discussed.
“Time to deliver”, said Prime Minister António Costa, during a virtual meeting with the press to discuss the priorities of the rotating Presidency of the Council of the EU (see EUROPE 12625/37).
The Portuguese Prime Minister welcomed the historic agreement to create, for the first time, a “joint debt issue to finance the recovery plan” to the tune of €750 billion.
The focus over the coming months will therefore have to be on implementing previous decisions: all of the national parliaments to approve the decision on own resources that will give shape to the recovery plan, and the 27 national recovery plans to be finalised. “Before we begin any new discussions, we need to implement the decisions that have already been made”, said Costa (see other news).
Augusto Santos Silva, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, noted that the aim was for the EU-27 to complete ratification of the own resources decision by the end of March (Italy and Cyprus are reported to have ratified it already).
He said that national recovery plans should be approved before the end of June.
Some countries, including Portugal, have already presented a first version of the recovery plan which is being discussed with the European Commission.
As soon as the Commission is able to borrow on the markets, the EU countries will be able to submit the final versions of their recovery plans and it should take “2 months for the Commission to make its assessment and 1 month for the Ecofin Council to approve each national plan”, according to Silva. The aim is for “the money to start to flow” in the spring. He said that a maximum of 13% could be made available in pre-financing. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur, with Camille-Cerise Gessant)