Strasbourg, FRANCE – MEPs have joined the battle over the EU’s next long-term budget with demands for increased spending and a more predictable financing plan for 2028-2034.
“Europe faces new realities, new crises, and new responsibilities from defence and security to competitiveness and resilience,” Parliament chief Roberta Metsola told reporters after the vote. “Europe cannot face a new era with an old budget.”
The European Parliament’s position on the next multiannual financial framework (MFF), co-authored by the Parliament’s lead budget negotiators Carla Tavares of the Socialists & Democrats and Siegfried Mureșan of the European People’s Party, was adopted with 655 total votes cast, of which 370 votes were in favour, 201 against and 84 abstentions.
Parliament is pushing for a 10% increase across the budget’s three programme headings, which sets their negotiation position at €2 trillion in current prices – whereas the Commission’s proposal stands at €1.8 trillion.
Agriculture, cohesion and social policy make up the largest part of the long-term budget. The Parliament is demanding an additional €103 billion to set aside for this, bringing the total to €997 billion.
“With the position of the parliament from today, we are restoring the unjustified cuts made by the European Commission to agriculture and to cohesion policy,” Muresan said, adding that Parliament was – along with the new EU’s priorities – not forgetting the bloc’s traditional ones, such as regional policy and agriculture.
MEPs also want to increase spending on improving the bloc’s competitiveness by €70 billion, which would see the funds increase to €660 billion – including €200 billion for research and innovation.
For external action, Parliament is demanding €24 billion in extra funding, which would grow the envelope to €239 billion.
A central demand is to exclude debt servicing costs linked to the EU’s pandemic recovery fund from the long-term budget. Instead, MEPs propose new revenue streams to finance both spending and debt repayment, including a digital tax on large technology companies, an online gambling levy and a capital gains tax on crypto assets.
MEPs also backed the reintroduction of distinct budget lines for agriculture, cohesion and social policy, alongside dedicated funding for health and environmental programmes.
With the vote, Parliament has set out its position ahead of negotiations with national governments in the Council of EU and the European Commission, intending to finalise the budget by the end of the year. But talks are expected to be difficult at a time of stretched national budgets and geopolitical uncertainty.
UPDATE: This piece has been updated with additional quotes from Roberta Metsola and Siegfried Mureșan.
(bw, jp)
Source:
www.euractiv.com