Includes: EUCO debrief, cohesion, budget camps, Irish presidency and more
This is Victoria Becker bringing you this week’s BUDGET BRIEF on the EU’s next seven-year spending plan.
EU leaders discussed the Cypriot ‘nego box’ for the first time last Friday, elevating the discussion about the next multi-annual financial framework’s spending figures to the highest political level.
The results of the discussion were hardly surprising and amounted to little more than richer countries reiterating the need for drastic cuts, employing an array of colourful descriptions – “mission impossible”, “no go box” or net payers not being the bloc’s “ATM”. Others, such as the cohesion-friendly group, wanted more ambition.
Even though a lot of the fighting talk is about size and priorities, the question of how to fund the budget and possible new revenue streams, or taxes, will have to start moving beyond rhetoric blows if leaders want to seal a deal by the end of the year.
