The Parliament takes the lead in the war for the two European trillions

The Parliament has played the game and has gotten ahead of the other co-legislator in one of the most important negotiations of the current legislature in Brussels. On the table is the two trillion budget for the next seven years, in which the reform of key areas of community action is included, such as agricultural policies or cohesion policies. The Eurodeputies have taken advantage of the move to go further and ask.

1.27% of the Union's national income is what the European Parliament aims to allocate for the next Multiannual Financial Framework. This represents 10% more than initially proposed by the European Commission last summer. Parliamentary sources consulted by Demócrata explain that what was intended in this week's vote was to achieve an ambitious framework with a view to entering into negotiations with the Council in which these final allocations are expected to be modified.

A step behind another 

The text that gathers the negotiating position of the MEPs, and which will finally be ratified during the next plenary session, openly rejects the merger of policies hitherto diversified into a single plan, as proposed by President Ursula von der Leyen. What's more, they affirm that this model, as it is conceived, can lead to generating uncertainty for the final beneficiaries and end up jeopardizing pillars such as territorial cohesion and social rights.

In contrast, what the European Parliament will propose when the Commission finally sits at the negotiating table with the States is a basket of new own resources, which are endowed with at least sixty billion euros annually to pay the debts of the Next Generation funds without cutting historical programs.

When analyzing one by one the sectoral allocations, the MEPs have agreed to allocate 385,000 million euros to the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), which would include direct aid, rural development and funds linked to the agreement with Mercosur. Likewise, the rapporteurs of the report, from the Partido Popular and the Grupo Socialista, show themselves convinced in their rejection of cuts in fishing, going as far as to propose 6,500 million euros for this sector.

The data of the Budget 

Estrasburgo considers that cohesion policy should receive 274,000 million euros, in addition to proposing a specific allocation of 110,000 million euros for the European Social Fund. It is also demanded to reinstate the program for the outermost regions, with an allocation of 6,500 million euros, after Bruselas' attempt to eliminate it. The Competitiveness Fund would increase to 234,000 million euros. Within this scope, Horizon Europe (177,000 M€), the "Connecting Europe" Facility (81,000 M€) and Erasmus (42,000 M€) are strengthened.

After the vote in the Committee on Budgets of the European Parliament, in which the report went ahead with the support of twenty-six parliamentarians, against nine against and five abstentions, Demócrata has taken the pulse of the mood among the main parliamentary groups. Populars and socialists share the hope that the new priorities that have been set in the new framework do not end with traditional policies, which are often defined as “the backbone of European solidarity”.

PP asks for more power for the Autonomous Communities 

The negotiator on behalf of the Spanish delegation of the Partido Popular is MEP Isabel Benjumea. Upon leaving the room where the legislators have given the green light to their negotiating position, she attends to Demócrata in her office on one of the highest floors of the Parliament's office in Brussels. “We have been clear. We do not like the national plans model proposed by the Commission”, she points out, stating that this system leaves regions aside when implementing community policies.

The populars defend their criticism "very harsh" of the design of these plans and ask for a clear leading role for the autonomous communities. "What we say is that cohesion policies cannot lose the European identity", explains Benjumea, who trusts that the recommendations of the Eurocámara "do not fall into a broken sack", which is why he urges the Community Executive to address the demands that have been ratified by a broad majority.

One of the maxims for the group chaired by the German Manfred Weber was the allocation dedicated to agricultural policies. It is for this reason that they celebrate having managed to claim in the approved report the need to “re-endow the PAC with a budget similar to the previous one” of the financial framework. Similarly, they welcome the fact that the text also reflects their discomfort with the possible competition of two policies “that in Spain have been and are essential such as cohesion policy and common agricultural policy”.

Gómez (PSOE): "We do not want a single euro to be lost"

On the other side of the hemicycle, they agree with the diagnosis. The coordinator of the group of European socialists is the Spanish MEP Sandra Gómez. Upon leaving one meeting and before entering the next, she shares with Demócrata the concern of her political family regarding the possible cuts to the PAC: “If we want to talk about sovereignty and food autonomy, that precisely involves taking care of the PAC”.

The socialists want to return to the previous model and give direct communication to the autonomous communities and intermediate administrations so that they can communicate and directly apply the projects subsidized by European funds. “We have put on the table giving the PAC the singularity and relevance that the Commission had taken away from it”, he insists, warning that they do not want “not a single euro to be lost based on the new priorities”, which he defines as “interesting and important”.

The calendar is pressing and in Brussels the possibility of legislators reaching an agreement before the end of the year seems increasingly distant. Gómez asks for prudence and “not to get one's fingers caught” during the negotiations without losing sight that “in the year 2028 there has to be a financial framework in force”.

This summer, the Council is expected to present its position on a framework that will end up articulating European action in practically all its facets. The political family led by the Spanish Iratxe García hopes that this week's step will serve for those on the other side of the Schuman roundabout to know the position of the parliamentarians, "to be able to reach an agreement between the three institutions."

The 90th minute

Every seven years, the community capital becomes a battlefield where each of the negotiating teams arrives at the tournament with a strategy under their arm to end up leaving with “the best of the possible ones”. The European Parliament has made the ball turn first with the intention that this ends up activating the rest of the teams, who for the moment do not reveal their tactic in one of the great games of the community institutions.