EU needs bigger budget to meet challenges, says commissioner-designate
Budget commissioner-designate Piotr Serafin believes the EU should be able to spend more than 1 per cent of Europe's wealth, given the challenges it faces. He said this during his confirmation hearing in the European Parliament on Thursday.
Drawing up a multiannual budget for the period after 2027 will be one of the biggest challenges for the new European Commission. Money is needed not only for agriculture, cohesion policy, digitalisation, the green transition and strengthening the European economy, but also for security and defence since Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
Serafin says the next multiannual budget should show that the EU is taking more responsibility for its future. "This means that we will have to finance our common priorities more than before," he said during his hearing in the Parliament on Thursday.
Breaking the ceiling
For decades, the EU's budget has amounted to around 1 per cent of member states' GDP. Member states that contribute more to the budget than they receive tend to defend this ceiling. But Serafin said on Thursday he did not believe it was possible to tackle all these challenges with just 1 per cent.
"We have to convince member states that sometimes it is better and cheaper to spend money at the European level," Serafin said. As commissioner, he also wants to put "maximum pressure" on member states to agree to new revenues for the European budget. One example is emissions trading, which could bring in around 36 billion euros a year.
"We have to convince member states that sometimes it is better and cheaper to spend money at the European level"
All these measures are unlikely to be enough. Former Italian prime minister Mario Draghi recently calculated that around 800 billion euros a year would be needed to maintain Europe's prosperity. Serafin acknowledged that private and institutional capital will also have to be tapped to meet all the financing needs.
© PHOTO NICOLAS TUCAT / AFP
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