“The European Parliament does not accept this proposal of national plans as a starting point for negotiating the next budget. We do not want a Europe à la carte with funds yet to be allocated. We want a balanced distribution across all regions, not just the less developed ones,” stated Carla Tavares today.
One day after the four pro-European groups in the European Parliament sent a letter to the European Commission President, Tavares pointed out that “the decision on the distribution of these essential development funds cannot be centralized solely within the Commission and the Member States, without the involvement and active participation of local and regional levels.”
“The European Parliament argues that the governance model proposed in these national plans must be reviewed and that Cohesion should not compete with the CAP,” which “are key policies and should be separately funded,” she added.
On Thursday, the center-right, socialist, liberal, and green parties in the European Parliament announced their rejection of the European Commission’s proposal for the EU budget, based on national plans, demanding a review.
“The European Parliament rejects the proposal of national and regional partnership plans as presented and demands a revised proposal to begin negotiations,” indicated the leaders of the majority parliamentary assembly in a letter sent to the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen.
In the letter, the political factions of the European People’s Party, the Socialists and Democrats, the liberal Renew Europe, and the Greens emphasized that “they cannot accept this proposal as a basis to initiate negotiations,” due to the approach of “one national plan per Member State.”
The letter, also signed by Carla Tavares, detailed “fundamental demands for a revised proposal from the European Commission,” including the elimination of “centralized national decisions” with the proposed national and regional partnership plans.
This parliamentary majority also demanded the reversal of the planned “substantial reduction” of agriculture and cohesion funds, which in their view should be autonomous policies, and for these dossiers to be provided with “appropriate budgetary responsibility.”
Additionally, it requested that the European Parliament be involved “in the approval and modification of Member States’ plans.”
Last July, the European Commission proposed a new long-term EU budget for 2028-2034, amounting to two trillion euros, up from the current framework of 1.2 trillion euros, including more national contributions and three new taxes.
The European Commission proposed that Portugal receive 33.5 billion euros in the new budget, including for cohesion and agriculture, under the framework of the national and regional partnership plan within the new EU budget until 2034.
This amount is part of the 865 billion euros proposed by the European Commission for investments and reforms in the 27 EU Member States, within the scope of the new 27 national and regional partnership plans with disbursements based on meeting objectives.
The current long-term EU budget (2021-2027) is 1.21 trillion euros (in current prices, which includes about 800 billion euros from the Recovery and Resilience Facility, financing the RRF), involving national contributions of 1.1%.
