Trust Funds: Member State contributions should match pledges

“The acute refugee crisis requires additional financing and extraordinary funds. We must solve the problems at the source, so the trust funds for Africa and Syria play a key role”, stated José Manuel Fernandes MEP, EPP Group Spokesman on Budgets and Parliament’s Rapporteur on the 2016 EU Budget.

"We are not only responsible for what we do but also for what we don't do. Given the urgency of the matter, pressure on the Member States to contribute to the trust funds must be stepped up. I call on the Commission to present a weekly update of Member State contributions to these EU funds”, added Reimer Böge MEP, Member of the Budgets Committee, reacting to the fact that the Member States have so far contributed very little to finance the required €2.3 billion in funding for the Trust Funds.

Mr Fernandes highlighted that, through the Draft Amending Budget 8/2015, “Member States will have €9.4 billion in extra revenues at the end of this year. It is clear that they should use the €2.3 billion from EU fines and customs duties to finance these trust funds - without any additional effort from national budgets. They should not pocket this money.”

So far, Member States have contributed only €47.3 million of the €500 million needed for the EU Regional Trust Fund for Syria and only €31.85 million from the €1.8 billion needed for the Emergency Trust Fund for Africa. 

“If, in the end, we do not manage to collect the necessary funding from the Member States, we should reintegrate the trust funds into the EU budget, thereby giving the European Parliament democratic oversight of their operation", concluded Böge.