Europarlement komt met voorstel om budgetimpasse over EU-hulp aan door overstromingen getroffen landen te doorbreken (en)

Met dank overgenomen van Europees Parlement (EP) i, gepubliceerd op dinsdag 5 juli 2011, 13:13.

The budget deadlock blocking €19.5 million in EU aid to help repair 2010 flood damage in Slovenia, Croatia and the Czech Republic should soon be broken. The Solidarity Fund has no money as such, so Parliament proposed Tuesday that the aid should come from unspent energy project funding instead. It hopes the Council will back this plan at a three-way meeting with the Commission.

The three countries were hard hit by flooding in 2010 but the €19.5 million in scheduled aid has not yet been paid, due to a dispute between Parliament and Council over where the money should come from. As the Solidarity Fund contains no money as such, fresh funds must be added or unused funds found within the budget. The Council proposed that the €19,5 million should come from the European Social Fund, but Parliament's Budgets Committee disagreed and proposed using unspent energy project funding instead.

Parliament's proposal

Parliament would prefer the €19,5 million to be funded with money which the European Commission says will not be spent on major energy projects this year (due to delays in implementation).

It also backs a proposal by rapporteur Sidonia Elzbieta Jedrzejewska (EPP, PL) to use a further €182.4 million in unspent energy funds to restore the so-called "negative reserve" that was previously used to fund solidarity aid.

Furthermore, Parliament accepted Ms Jedrzejewska's proposal that a further €50 million from these unspent funds be added to the European Globalisation Fund (EGF).

Ms Jedrzejewska believes this is the best solution to all three issues: solidarity aid for Slovenia, Croatia and the Czech Republic, balancing the "negative reserve" and refilling the EGF line. "I hope that Council will share our position", she concluded.

The aid for Slovenia, Croatia and the Czech Republic (report by Reimer Böge, EPP, DE) was approved with 644 votes in favour, 16 against and 5 abstentions. The decision on funding for this aid (Jedrzejewska report)  was passed with 619 votes in favour, 39 against and 11 abstentions.

Procedure: Budgetary