Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-12-17-Speech-3-044"
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"en.20081217.3.3-044"2
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"Mr President, for years, a serious, recurring problem with our budget has been the significant gap between the funds committed and the actual payments made. This difference has grown this year to an unacceptable degree, thereby endangering the credibility and meaning of the entire budgetary process. In 2009, at a time of economic and financial crisis, we simply cannot allow this to happen. It is the joint responsibility of the Commission and Member States to speed up and simplify payments and thereby restore the credibility of the European Union’s budget.
Secondly, I thank my fellow Members for having supported the numerous important recommendations I made to the budget package. This package contained five main priorities: state-of-the-art environmental protection (including a 10% increase for the LIFE programme), innovative business development, the fight against corruption, progressive social policy and a significant expansion of the world’s largest student exchange programme, the Erasmus Mundus. Thank you very much for your support in this, as I consider that these are important matters.
Finally, every year I am obliged to draw attention to the fact that the financing of our foreign policy objectives is inadequate. In next year’s budget, this is even more obvious. It is only with the help of creative accounting that we were able to secure a source of funds for the most important goals. There is only one reassuring aspect to this unfortunate situation: a proper, comprehensive mid-term review. If we do not do this, it will be difficult to take seriously the European Union’s ambition to be a global player."@en1
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