The European Parliament negotiating group, led by Christophe Grudler (Renew Europe, French), and the Czech Presidency of the EU Council will meet for a first exchange on the regulation establishing a new constellation for secure connectivity on Thursday 27 October, from 12.30 to 14.30.
As always at a first meeting, the co-legislators will present their respective positions without going into an article-by-article analysis of the text. However, after the approval of the four-column table developed at technical level (a document that compares the versions of the text of each EU institution line by line) at the beginning of the meeting, the co-legislators will address five main points.
They will discuss: - the budgetary issue (the European Parliament proposes, among other things, that the Member States provide “fresh money” to finance the new programme and expects a lot from the mid-term review of the 2021-2027 Multiannual Financial Framework, whereas the EU Council has preferred a low-binding earmarking without mentioning new resources - see EUROPE 12982/10); - the ‘New Space’ and the European space ecosystem as a whole (the European Parliament has strengthened the role of SMEs and start-ups in subcontracts in particular - see EUROPE 13023/8); - launch requirements; - the strengthening of the environmental dimension introduced by the European Parliament (Article 6a - EUROPE 13042/12); - lastly, the perennial question of the distribution of tasks and roles between the European Space Agency and the EU Agency for the Space Programme.
However, there is a consensus on the text and the positions between the two co-legislators are not so far apart from each other nor from the original European Commission proposal (see EUROPE 12891/3). The co-legislators therefore hope to conclude the negotiations in just two interinstitutional meetings and, in any case, under the Czech Presidency of the EU Council (see EUROPE 12993/6). The second interinstitutional meeting is scheduled to take place on 17 November.
To view the four-column table: https://aeur.eu/f/3so (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)