EU Budget 2014-2020 to finance most pressing issues and set timetable for getting out of crisis

The European Parliament has approved the political compromise on the 2014-2020 budget by a large majority at its plenary session in Strasbourg

Alain Lamassoure MEP, Chairman of the Budgets Committee of the European Parliament, and Jean-Luc Dehaene MEP, European Parliament Rapporteur on own resources, welcomed the vote:

"The European Parliament was realistic. The EU budget is financed by national budgets. National budgets are in ruins. It was not possible to obtain higher figures”, said Lamassoure.

“Nevertheless, after long and difficult negotiations, we managed to achieve:

• €1 billion for the Fund for European Aid to the most deprived which will thus be increased to €3.5 billion for 2014-2020;
• an additional €200 million for research in 2014-2015;
• an additional €150 million for the Erasmus Programme in 2014-2015;
• €50m for the COSME Programme to help the competitiveness of SMEs for 2014-2015;
• The securing of funding for the new programme dedicated to youth employment for the period 2014-2020, whereas governments only guaranteed funding for the first two years.

“We also ensured that the whole framework be revised in 2016 for implementation in 2017. In the context of this review, a process of reforming the financing of the EU budget will be launched in the autumn."

"A viable own resource system is the only way to put an end to haggling over national contributions. It enables Member States to reduce their annual GNI-based payments to the EU which, in times of severe budgetary constraints, is more than welcome", said Jean-Luc Dehaene.

"We therefore welcome the agreement reached with the Member States and the preliminary green light given by the European Parliament to set up a high-level group that will undertake a general review of the own resources system guided by the principles of simplicity, transparency and democratic accountability", he explained.

"This agreement on the overall legislative framework allows negotiations to continue in order to clarify the distribution of funds within each policy", said Alain Lamassoure.

"The final vote in Parliament will only take place when the €11.2 billion needed to finish the year 2013 is confirmed by the Council. This compromise will not save Europe but it will finance the most pressing issues and will launch a timetable for getting out of the current crisis", he concluded.