Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2013-11-19-Speech-2-020-000"
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"en.20131119.4.2-020-000"2
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"Mr President, well here we are, nine months on: an awful lot of hot air has been expended, an awful lot of threats have been made that, of course, have never materialised, and at its core we still have the MFF deal that our governments negotiated in February.
My Group has always said that the next seven-year budget should achieve two key principles: firstly, of course, to reduce it, and secondly, to reprioritise it away from headings that do not add economic value in a 21st Century global economy. This MFF, in our view, is a small step in the right direction. Of course, it did not go as far as we would have hoped. However, it shows that the costs of the EU can be reduced and the value to taxpayers can be increased.
Today’s vote marks the culmination of a long process that began several years ago when this Parliament first began drafting the report by the Special Committee on the Policy Challenges and Budgetary Resources for a sustainable European Union after 2013 (SURE). That Committee then proposed a 5 % budget increase. It wanted new own resources. It wanted taxes on anything from flying to sails, to CO
and it called for the abolition of fully justified national rebates.
Thankfully, almost none of this has materialised. Only in the area of own resources has Parliament achieved a very minor concession which will see a gaggle of so-called ‘independent wise men’ from the three institutions dreaming up a whole host of new ways to spend more taxpayers’ money on their pet EU projects.
However, I am certainly not going to lose much sleep over that group. The Treaty is clear: the own resources remain within the Council’s power under unanimity, and I think in our heart of hearts we all know it is just not going to happen. Because new own resources would fundamentally change the relationship between the EU and national governments. That is why it is not going to happen. Instead of being their servants it would become their master, forcing them to raise revenue to spend on whatever new scheme takes this Chamber’s fancy. And, of course, those who call for new own resources are the same people who consistently call for more Europe, somehow as the answer to all of our ills, as if throwing money at the problem will somehow solve it.
Just as we need a better Europe, we need better and more effective spending. That is why we generally welcome the outcome of the negotiations on the various spending regulations. Many of these programmes will help to promote cross-border research, to plug the holes in the single market’s infrastructure and to support the newer members of the Union. However, these programmes are, by their very nature, multiannual and they rely on certainty. The posturing that we have seen from many in this Parliament since February, and particularly since the summer, will make it difficult for many of those schemes to be properly up and running by 1 January.
I do however agree with Parliament in one important area: the budgetary management of the Commission has been appalling. We cannot and must not end up in a situation whereby we are regularly returning to national governments, like Oliver Twist constantly asking for more. When overspends do occur, savings should be made from elsewhere to compensate. It is time that the EU learned to live within its means. A satisfactory outcome to these negotiations does not dampen our demands for root and branch budgetary reform.
Overall, we think this agreement represents a fair compromise between north, south, east and west, between net contributors and between net recipients. Nine months on, and we are voting fundamentally on the same agreement that we had in February. This Parliament has postured and strutted during this unedifying process, but in reality we can be clear that the Council’s common position and common sense has prevailed. For us, it serves as an illustration that it is possible to make the EU do less and do it better."@en1
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