In a plenary debate on Monday 17 May, MEPs welcomed the Interinstitutional Agreement reached on the Just Transition Fund in late 2020 (see EUROPE 12620/12), before approving it on Tuesday with a solid majority (615 votes for, 35 against, 46 abstentions). But many deplored the drastic reduction of the overall budget to 17.5 billion euros.
MEPs noted that the priorities of the European Parliament had been safeguarded. Among them was shadow rapporteur Pedro Marques (S&D, Spain), who put the focus on making the Fund’s support conditional on meeting the EU’s climate targets, and the green reward mechanism.
The Chair of the Committee on Regional Development (REGI), Younous Omarjee (The Left, France), welcomed the fact that co-legislators had banned investment in gas infrastructure. The rapporteur for the Committee on Budgets (BUDG), Siegfried Mureşan (EPP, Romania), welcomed the decoupling of cohesion policy from the Fund, against the advice of the European Commission.
But the question of the overall budget was often raised. For example, the shadow rapporteur Ondřej Knotek(Renew Europe, Czech Republic) and the rapporteur for the European Parliament Committee on Industry, Research and Energy (ITRE) and initiator of the Fund’s proposal, Jerzy Buzek (EPP, Poland), insisted on the need to continue the financial effort to support these regions after 2027. Mr Buzek said that the effort should continue for at least 30 years.
Niklas Nienass, the German shadow rapporteur for the Greens/EFA group, admitted that the allocated envelope was “too little” to cater for the hundred or so regions that will need it. “It is simply a shame,” he concluded.
European Parliament rapporteur Manolis Kefalogiannis (EPP, Greece) reiterated that the Fund should be seen in the context of the Just Transition Mechanism. Combined with the InvestEU programme and European Investment Bank operations, the total effort would be 100 billion euros, he said.
The Commissioner for Jobs and Social Rights, Nicolas Schmit, tried to play down the budget cut. While the Fund’s budget has been reduced, it should not be forgotten that in the meantime the Recovery and Resilience Facility, the core instrument of the Next Generation EU recovery plan has been put forward. He reiterated that this budgetary instrument devoted 37% of its envelope to greening the economy. Furthermore, the Commissioner underlined the possible synergies between the Just Transition Fund and the European Social Fund Plus.
To view the agreed text: https://bit.ly/3tZ7KUQ (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)