Begrotingscomité steunt tweesporenbeleid Meerjarig Financieel Kader (en)
Parliament's Budgets Committee gave its support on Tuesday to the two-track negotiations on the EU long-term budget (MFF) and an amending budget for 2013, which was agreed Monday evening in a meeting of the Presidents of the European Parliament, Council and Commission.
With this agreement, Parliament would be ready to start negotiations on the MFF and to accept a two-step approach to mobilize additional funds to pay this year's bills. The European Commission had proposed €11.2 billion in additional funds to pay outstanding bills for 2013. The Budgets Committee accepts that this sum is to be paid in a first tranche of €7.3 billion, while the remaining €3.9 billion could be paid later, so long as the overall amount is covered this year.
The amending budget for 2013 was a precondition for Parliament to start negotiations on the MFF. For the details on the conclusions and a statement by President Schulz, click on the link on the right.
Two-step approach
In a political orientation vote, an overwhelming majority of committee members supported the agreement reached on Monday evening
Committee chair Alain Lamassoure i (EPP, FR) said he expected that the "ECOFIN meeting on 14 May will give a clear political sign in the same sense. Meanwhile, negotiations on the MFF can already start on Monday 13 May. Should the ECOFIN not confirm this approach negotiations could be interrupted". In any case, he added, "we will not give our consent on the MFF, should we come to an agreement on it, before having the second tranche of the €11.2 billion guaranteed".
€1 billion back to the Member States
The committee also voted on two other amending budgets.
One aims to return the budget surplus of last year, €1.023 billion, to the Member States. This would alleviate the effort of national budgets to meet the outstanding bills.
The €1.023 billion will be proportionally deducted from the contributions of the individual member states for this year. This money (€719.1 million) comes primarily from higher than expected revenues, such as fines and interests on late payments. Only €244 million were committed funds which remained unused, which is historically low and means that almost 100% of the budget was used. €60 million comes from exchange rate differences.
Croatia's accession must be funded with fresh money
Finally, the committee expressed its support for yet another amending budget, to finance the accession of Croatia. This would require the adaptation of the ceilings of the current MFF (€666 million more in commitments and €374 million more in payments), which for MEPs should be a mere formality in view of the Interinstitutional Agreement between Parliament and Council.
The committee stressed the importance of financing the amending budget for Croatia through fresh money as a strong political signal towards the new member state.
The three amending budgets still need to be voted formally by the Budgets Committee and the full House, after approval by the Council of Ministers.