Brussels, 10/10/2007 (Agence Europe) - After long debate, the European Parliament budgets committee managed to agree, on Tuesday 9 October, its recommendations on first reading of the draft budget for 2008. According to the budget amendments voted through by the committee, it will be necessary to revise the financial perspectives if the EU wants to ensure the launch of Galileo, and the flexibility instrument will have to be used to fund aid to Kosovo and Palestine. The European Parliament will carry out its first reading of the draft budget in Strasbourg on 23 October. The second reading by EU finance ministers will take place on 23 November 2007.
Total expenditure. The total payment appropriations called for by the budgets committee would be more than 0.98% of the EU27's gross national income (GNI), a sharp rise on the first reading of the Council (0.95% of GNI) and even slightly higher than the European Commission's initial proposals (0.97%). This is logical because the EP has taken on board the funding required for Galileo and additional aid for Kosovo and Palestine.
Flexibility instrument. The PES and EPP-ED groups agree on using the flexibility instrument to provide €87 million in commitment appropriations, €40m for the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) to achieve the amount recommended by the European Commission and endorsed by the Council, namely €200m; €20m to provide some of the aid for Kosovo (€436m in total), €20m to provide some of the aid for Palestine (€300m in total) and €7m to complete funding for two programmes: €3m for an information programme for outside the EU (radio programmes in Farsi (the language of Iran) out of a total of €7m) and €4m for the fund to fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria (of a total of €50m for the fund).
The Flexibility Instrument (FI) makes it possible to find an extra €200m under a heading to which all the money had been allocated. The Council has always been very hostile to using the Flexibility Instrument. The budgets committee cut the funding for the CFSP by 20% to fund various programmes under the 'external actions' heading, in other words €40m. The committee suggests filling the gap by providing the missing €40m from the Flexibility Instrument, also as a way of encouraging the Council to negotiate with the EP over use of the FI.
Galileo. While awaiting the European Commission's suggestions, the Council only earmarked €151m in commitment appropriations for Galileo (see EUROPE 9467). According to the EP amendments, Galileo's budget for 2008 should be increased to €890m in commitment appropriations (and €400m in payment appropriations). Like the Commission, the EP wants the EU budget to provide all the funding needed to bring Galileo on stream. Through its amendments, the EP would also like to get the member states to negotiate a revision of the financial perspectives (the EU's budget) proposed by the Commission (see EUROPE 9519 on the most recent Ecofin discussions on this issue).
For the European Technology Institute (ETI), the budgets committee recommends providing €2.9m funding for the ETI's board (in commitment appropriations and payment appropriations) and to create a new budget line to fund 'communities for knowledge and innovation'. The ETI's running costs have been transferred from the Education and Culture heading to the Research and Innovation heading.
Frontex. The budgets committee hugely increased the budget of Frontex, the EU's border control agency, to nearly €70m (see EUROPE 9518).
The MEPs amended the reductions made by the Council in first reading to Heading 1a (competitiveness for growth and employment) - particularly funding for research and innovation - and Heading 1b (cohesion) by re-introducing most of the spending levels initially foreseen by the European Commission in its Preliminary Draft Budget for 2008. (lc)