EU budget: Meloni says negotiations are still a long way from being concluded
Significant results have already been achieved, but we are now entering a more delicate phase
(Il Sole 24 Ore Radiocor) - "Another key item on the agenda for the forthcoming European Council will be the negotiations on the Multiannual Financial Framework. This is a complex and important matter, because the EU budget is not merely an accounting exercise. It is the instrument through which we actually decide what the priorities for the future will be and how many resources we are prepared to make available for those priorities.” Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni emphasised this in her address to the Senate on the forthcoming European Council. “In recent months,” she added, “we have already achieved several concrete results compared with the Commission’s original proposal. Member States will play a more decisive role in managing the new instruments: decisions on how to use the resources will not be made solely in Brussels. The Common Agricultural Policy and the Common Fisheries Policy will retain their own identities and safeguards”, “on the rule of law, we have secured clearer and more objective rules to prevent it from being exploited for political ends”. Furthermore, “the new European Competitiveness Fund will offer greater safeguards for small and medium-sized enterprises” and “governments will have a greater say in defining the priorities of the Union’s external action. These are important results, but the negotiations are still a long way from being concluded. Indeed, we are now entering the most delicate phase: that of negotiating the actual size of the budget and where to find the necessary resources.”
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