“Increased defence spending must not come at the expense of our European social model”, Commissioner for Budget, Anti-Fraud and Public Administration Piotr Serafin attempted to reassure during a debate on the post-2027 Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) in the European Parliament on Wednesday 9 July.
The European commissioner has smoothed things over: more flexible, simpler and guided by the imperative of competitiveness, the EU’s long-term budget will not forget the common agricultural policy or cohesion, and will not be done without the regions.
In response, Jean-Marc Germain (S&D, French) warned that his group would “never accept the abolition of the European Social Fund (ESF+)“ or the principle of “money for reforms”, and that it would not vote for the MFF as planned. The S&D made its support for President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen during the vote on the far-right’s motion of censure conditional on maintaining the ESF+ (see EUROPE 13678/1).
A few hours later, on the Bluesky social network, the S&D group welcomed the inclusion of the “European Social Fund (ESF+) (...) in the next Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF)”.
With a week to go before publication of the European Commission’s proposal on 16 July, Wednesday’s debate was above all an opportunity for the political groups to reiterate their priorities and red lines.
“Renationalising and sacrificing the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and the ESF+” would mean “turning our backs on millions of citizens”, agreed Younous Omarjee (The Left, French).
Fabienne Keller (Renew Europe, French) and Lucia Yar (Renew Europe, Slovakian) focused on the budget’s size and adopting new own resources. “We can shape the European Union with money”, said Ms Yar.
Proposed by the European Commission (see EUROPE 13641/8), adopting new own resources will require unanimity in the EU Council. The financing “will have to take account of the Member States’ budgetary situation and the tax burden on citizens and businesses”, warned Danish Minister of European Affairs Marie Bjerre, whose country inherited the rotating presidency of the EU Council at the beginning of July.
“We need investment”, acknowledged Ms Bjerre. The MFF proposal will be ambitious, warned Piotr Serafin, who defended the need to invest together to implement projects at EU level in order to develop “a European alternative to Starlink”, to “protect (...) [the EU’s] external borders” and to “make progress in the field of research”. The European commissioner is also counting on Parliament’s “continued support” for own resources.
A “contact group” was set up in Parliament on Tuesday 8 July at the Conference of Presidents, with a view to negotiations on the next MFF. President of the European Parliament Roberta Metsola, representatives of each group, the co-rapporteurs on the MFF and on own resources, and the chairs of the Committee on Budgets and Committee on Budgetary Control will take part. (Original version in French by Florent Servia)