Committee on Budgets Joint meeting Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs Joint Committee meeting BUDG-ECON
Legend
Transcript markers
- text Sentence being played
- text Search result
- text Intervention cited by the link you opened
Click a sentence to play the video from that moment. Select text to quote it with the speaker, timestamp and link.
More options
Offset
Transcript offset
Export
Live capture
Versions of this video
Transcripts may differ slightly from one version to another.
BUDG, ECON European Parliament
Raffaele Fitto
By the 30th of September, the Commission received the final payment request from all 27 Member States, which takes the number of payment requests received to 163. The Commission has already finalized the assessment of the last payment requests of Denmark and Sweden and already disbursed the payments. Additionally, the Commission finalized the preliminary assessment of the last payment request of France and Austria, which will be adopted and disbursed at the end of the month. In total, the payment requests currently under assessment cover 1,784 milestones and targets for an amount of 114 billion euros. In addition, 76 milestones and targets worth 6.8 billion euros have already been preliminarily assessed by the Commission and will be disbursed in the coming weeks.
We are now left with 73 days until the end of the year. As outlined in the Commission's guidance on the closure of the RRF, the timeline for the final payment request will be shorter than usual in order to make the payments by the end of 2026. Taking this into account, by the 20th of November, the Commission intends to provide its preliminary assessment of the final payment requests.
The Economic and Financial Committee expressed its intention to provide its opinion by the 8th of December. This would allow the Commission to authorize the payments by the 18th of December and for the payments to be made by the 31st of December. The good cooperation with the Member States has helped prepare the Commission's assessment, and the Commission services are now finalizing their assessment of the final payment requests. Based on the assessment made so far and the exchanges with the Member States, we expect that most milestones and targets in the national RRPs will be considered as satisfactorily fulfilled. Honorable members, we have come a very long way.
The successful closure of the RRF is on track and within reach. As I mentioned earlier, a key factor behind this progress has been the effort by Member States and the Commission to simplify and revise plans where necessary, helping to make implementation more focused and assessments more efficient.
This has helped us reduce the number of remaining milestones and targets by 25% without compromising on ambition, but at the same time focusing on the reality on the ground. Also, the closure guidelines adopted by the Commission in April provided transparency and helped to ensure the smooth assessment of the final payment requests. Looking back to the past years of the RRF, Europe proved it could act with speed, determination, and impact, delivering real results when they mattered most. Valdis will now focus more on this in his intervention. I look forward to our discussion.
Valdis Dombrovskis
Honorable co-chairs, honorable members, I am pleased to return to this House for our 24th dialogue. We have come a long way in implementing the RRF, with 450 billion euros already disbursed to Member States and nearly 70% of milestones and targets already assessed positively. A final effort is now required to bring the RRF to a successful conclusion. The impact of the RRF has been very significant.
By the end of 2025, 95% of the RRF grants disbursed to Member States have been spent. Public investment in the EU rose to 3.9% of GDP in 2025, up from 3.2% of GDP in 2019, with the RRF playing a major role in this increase. This stands in sharp contrast to the prolonged decline in public investment following the global financial crisis. We expect the NextGenerationEU to raise EU's real GDP by 1.4% in 2026 compared to the scenario without the RRF. This is a conservative estimate since it does not take into account RRF reforms.
In addition, cross-border spillover effects are estimated to generate almost 140 billion euros in economic impact within the EU. In highly integrated economies such as Germany, the Netherlands, Ireland, Luxembourg, Austria and Denmark, the impact of the RRF is double the size of their national plans. Other important impacts include a reduction of CO2 emissions by around 54 million tonnes each year and a one and a half multiplier for every euro spent on digital investments.
We will continue to analyze these impacts. All member states have submitted their final payment requests on time by the 30th of September deadline. We have already examined more than half of the outstanding milestones and targets, and we will assess the remaining ones before the end of the year. While this represents a large volume of work in a short period, the Commission has prepared well and I can report that assessments are broadly on track. Denmark was the first member state to complete its recovery and resilience plan and to receive its last payment, and Sweden has also received its final payment last week.
We expect France and Austria joining these countries soon by the end of the month. Overall, we expect to disburse most of the amounts committed to member states, but some reductions are also likely to arise from unmet milestones and targets. Given the scale of the RRF, it is natural that it has been subject to close scrutiny and high expectations in terms of accountability.
The Commission has applied the requirements of the RRF Regulation diligently and published its assessments scrutinizing milestones and targets. The European Court of Auditors recently published annual report reviewed about half of the milestones and targets on the basis of which Commission made payments in 2023. For 96% of milestones and targets, the Commission and the ECA are in full agreement. In fact, our views differ just on 16 of them. For six of these findings, the ECA applied a different concept of double funding and eligibility start date than the Commission and Member States.
The remaining 10 arise from case-specific differences in reading milestones and targets. The Commission replies explains those differences in views. I would add that when it comes to audits and controls, the scrutiny will not end on 31st of December. Member States must continue to ensure efficient, effective and efficient controls and carry out audit work into 2027, and the Commission will continue its own controls and audits to ensure Member States comply with their obligations. OLAF, the EPPO and the ECA will also continue to exercise their respective powers of control, investigation and audit.
Honorable members, to conclude. The Commission has now about one month to finalize the assessment of all final payment requests to meet the deadline for ordinary disbursement set on 31st of December. Building on our extensive preparatory work, we will continue to apply our rigorous methodology to close the facility in a thorough, transparent and successful manner. With this, I look forward to your questions and today's discussion. Thank you.
Thank you so much. Q and A session. Now I will give the floor to the members of BUDG and ECON committee for two minutes each and then the Commissioner will have three minutes each to answer to the question. I will start with Isabel Benjumea.
Isabel Benjumea Benjumea
Thank you, chair. I will be speaking in Spanish. Señores comisarios, llevo denunciando en este Parlamento durante todos estos años la muy nefasta gestión del Gobierno de español de los fondos Next Generation. Una muy nefasta gestión que afecta no solo a los españoles, sino a todos los europeos. Desde el año 21 no sabemos, no conocemos el dato de ejecución final de los fondos.
También seguimos sin conocer el listado de los 100 mayores beneficiarios porque el Gobierno se niega a publicarlo, el dato de ejecución y la lista de los 100 mayores beneficiarios. Llevamos cinco años de incumplimiento sistemático del reglamento de estos fondos con una gravísima falta de transparencia que constantemente ha denunciado el Tribunal de Cuentas Europeo. Lo que sí sabemos es que el Gobierno ha renunciado a 62.000 millones de los préstamos y también sabemos que el Gobierno tiene 35.000 millones de euros pendientes de ejecutar, eso si damos por buenos los datos de transferencias del Gobierno. Un Gobierno que además ha aprobado reformas vinculadas a estos fondos que han supuesto un auténtico fracaso, como la reforma educativa, solo hay que ver los datos de PISA, la fiscal, la de vivienda o la de pensiones. Un Gobierno que ha utilizado estos fondos europeos para pagar gasto corriente y pensiones, una de las cosas prohibidas por el reglamento.
Y además tapándolo con juegos de ingeniería contable. En definitiva, como llevo todos estos años diciendo, un auténtico desastre que tendrá consecuencias no solo para los españoles, sino para todos los europeos. Y tengo tres preguntas. ¿Saben ustedes, señores comisarios, en qué se ha gastado el Gobierno el dinero de todos los europeos?
¿Conocen ustedes el dato de ejecución final, no de transferencias, el dato de ejecución final, es decir, en qué se lo han gastado? ¿Y qué consecuencias puede tener para los españoles si se confirman las acusaciones de desviación y uso indebido de estos fondos europeos por parte del gobierno? Yo se lo pregunto porque desde luego los españoles lo desconocemos. Gracias.
Siegfried Mureşan
Thank you, Madam Chair. Commissioners, thank you for joining us this evening and thank you for all the work that you and your services have been doing in these months. I have three structural questions on the successful conclusion of this instrument. And the first one, of course, we have now seen a performance-based instrument from the early planning and design phase to the revisions and to the final payments. And my first question is, what do you consider the main lessons and what would you keep from this performance-based instrument into the next MFF and what we should better not keep?
This is my first question.
My second question, of course, plans have been constantly revised over the duration of the RRF and particularly over the course of the last year. And we will be interested to hear as a Parliament how Member States have implemented milestones, targets and investments, not only in relation to the revised plans, but also in relation to their initial plans, because constantly lowering the bar and then claiming that we met it close to 100% will not really help us to understand in the end what went well and what we could have done better. And the question is, will you be providing the Parliament with an assessment of the implementation of milestones and targets in relation to the revised plans, also in relation to the initial plans? We would very much be interested to also hear comparisons with the initial plans. And my third and last question is, as commissioners have said, a significant number of payments with more than 100 billion euros of disbursements are still to be assessed in the last weeks.
And the question is, how will the Commission manage this workload to ensure that for all Member States the same standards apply and to also ensure that nothing is overlooked because of the tight deadline? So what is the plan of the Commission for the last weeks? Thank you very much.
Speaker 12
Thank you so much. I give the floor to Vice-President Fitto for three minutes.
Raffaele Fitto
Thank you. I would like to start from the point about the final recipients for Spain, but also for all Member States.
The 2026 RRF annual report published on the 7th of October looks into this issue. The largest final recipients are public authorities responsible for the provision of public goods. They account for around 63% of the 100 largest final recipients, down from 70% in the 2024-2025 reporting cycle. They also account for about 82% of the funds received by the 100 largest final recipients. They are mostly key ministries which are implementing public investment in the areas of territorial infrastructure, digitalization and sustainable mobility, among others.
We can also find large companies operating in these areas. It is also important to note that more than 6 million companies have received support from the RRF since its inception until end 2025. About the the impact of RRF in this period and also in the perspective of the next proposal of MFF. I think that it's very important to underline that the proposal for the next MFF is now in co-decision.
The final outcome depends on further work by the Council and the European Parliament. When preparing this proposal, the Commission took stock of what worked well and less well under current EU programs. The national and regional partnership plans are built on the lessons learned from the RRF and other EU funds, such as cohesion, common agriculture policy and home affairs funds. Our goal has been to make the delivery of EU support faster and more impactful, notably by linking funding to reforms, while building on cohesion funds, multi-level governance and strong regional dimensions. The Commission also took into account the recommendations made by the European Court of Auditors and the Parliament about transparency, flexibility and the new shared management system clearly defines ex-ante the Commission's responsibilities.
I think that we have to continue in this way and the positive impact that we have on the RRF, I think that we have to understand the good lessons also that we learned for the future. Thank you.
Valdis Dombrovskis
Yes, thank you very much for those questions. Well, first of all on Spain, as Executive Vice-President Fitto already indicated, well, we do have a list of 100 biggest recipients from Spain and this list is being regularly updated. Also generally, as was mentioned in my introductory remarks, we see that 95% of grants allocated to Member States have been spent and as I was mentioning, we are also obviously looking at what impact, including macroeconomic impact, this spending is having on the EU economy. Specifically on Spain, we are currently assessing the last payment request and indeed there is a large amount of milestones and targets which need to be assessed in a context of this last payment request.
Well, this again is a fairly difficult situation we are facing with Member States and correspondingly we have been also preparing these assessments in advance, urging Member States also to provide with evidence on fulfillment of milestones and targets already, so to say, prior to the formal submission of payment requests, exactly keeping this aspect in mind, how large number of milestones and targets we need to assess in the last moment. Then on lessons learned from implementation of Recovery and Resilience Facility, I think some of the lessons had been incorporated already in our proposal for the next MFF for a design of national and regional partnerships plans. I would highlight in particular three elements. One, that this approach of performance-based instrument and combining reforms and investments is working, is a successful approach to continue with this. Second, what we propose that we continue with NRPP under shared management, unlike the direct management of RRF.
I think that's another important lesson. And third, having a stronger involvement of regional and local authorities, which has been, I would say, strong push from those authorities in a context of RRF.
So we have heard this, and that's another lesson which we are integrating in in this. Then whether we would now start comparing implementation of milestones and targets in RRPs to the original plans and each revision of the plans. As you know, there had been several revisions of the plans. Well, that's normally not our intention, as this would create substantial additional burden both for Commission, but also discussing how how big the volume of milestones and targets we need to assess now, because, well, the implementation has been, so to say, backloaded by Member States. That's that's a fact.
So we are facing big push right now. But also it's worth noting that for a number of Member States, also the size of the plans has been substantially reduced. The biggest decommitments, notably all the decommitments were in loans part. The biggest decommitments were once again in case of Spain, but also number of other countries.
So the second biggest countries were Romania and Poland in terms of those loans decommitments. So it wouldn't make sense to assess whether certain investments have been implemented where the corresponding amounts which would be available are decommitted already, you know. So there had been some reductions also on the size of the plans. But in any case, also in case of the revision of the plans, also the new plans, revised plans have to meet all the requirements of Recovery and Resilience Facility regulation. And we had been strict with this and following that this is the case and the overall ambition of the plans is not being lost.
Victor Negrescu
Thank you, Chair, Commissioners. Indeed, the Recovery and Resilience Facility was an unprecedented European response to an unprecedented crisis. And of course it demonstrated that common borrowing and European solidarity can support economic recovery and protect investment. But as we approach its conclusion, we also need to be honest on the actual impact and what can be improved in the years to come.
As you are aware, I worked together with other colleagues on the European Parliament's Recovery and Resilience Facility implementation report, and there we suggested greater flexibility, the possibility to extend the implementation period, but also to reduce bureaucracy. Many of our recommendations have been taken into consideration by the Commission, and I want to thank you for that. Nevertheless, we still notice that some of the challenges that we tried to tackle were not treated openly and directly by the Commission, especially when it comes to the quality and the long-term impact of the investments, but also on how actually the reforms have been drafted, because we strongly believe that we need genuine consultation and national ownership when it comes to those respective reforms. You mentioned, Commissioner, Romania. We started with a 29.2 billion euros recovery plan and we went down to 20.1 billion euros, also because the reforms were not the result of consultations and national ownership.
Therefore, I have a few questions.
How can we claim success when the long-term economic impact remains uncertain and thousands of measures have been revised? Secondly, how will you ensure that countries like Romania, for instance, receive full support from the Commission for their final payment and of course also whether they will be offered the possibility to submit additional evidence, also why not next year? Because I was looking at this report that was drafted based on the RRF scoreboard. My country, for instance, ranks amongst the countries with the lowest percentage of milestones and targets completed, only 15%, and I'm wondering if we can offer more flexibility. And last and not least, what are the lessons that you are taking when it comes to genuine ownership on the future reforms if they will be needed in the next partnership plans?
Giuseppe Lupo
Grazie Presidente. Abbiamo ascoltato con interesse, io penso che il metodo sia quello giusto, il metodo del dialogo, dell'ascolto, del confronto fra Commissione parlamentare e Commissari. È stato penso importante ascoltare che l'RRF ha dato risultati molto positivi, certo forse si poteva fare meglio in molti paesi, ma complessivamente il Commissario Dombrovskis ha detto con chiarezza che il PNRR sosterrà, il Next Generation EU sosterrà nel 2026 la crescita del PIL, se ho capito bene, per più 1,4%.
È un dato molto importante. E anche il commissario Fitto ha detto che l'impatto dell'RRF è positivo e che quindi deve servire l'esperienza anche per il futuro. Quindi vorrei fare due domande. La prima è se condividete quindi la necessità di sostenere un quadro finanziario pluriennale 2028-2034 in linea con le richieste del Parlamento europeo. La seconda è l'altra faccia della medaglia, e cioè se condividete la necessità di respingere i tagli che al QFP propone il Consiglio.
Raffaele Fitto
Thank you. I would like to start from the last question because it is from my side very easy. The proposal of the European Commission is ambitious about the MFF and now we have to wait the decisions that the co-legislators will take in the coming months. I cannot say other issues about these possibilities.
The other questions about the impact and also the investment under the RRF deliver lasting impact beyond 2026 that was this question. Recovery and Resilience Plans finance transformational investment, for example, contributing to the green and digital transition and structural reforms, often aligned with the country-specific recommendations. Additionally, the investment impulse of RRF funding will extend beyond 2026, even after the end of disbursement of Member States. This is thanks to measures such as financial instruments, for example, RRF-financed capital transfers to state-owned enterprises or national promotional banks and the national contribution to EU programs, which will generate investment over a longer horizon. Our most recent estimates of the direct impact of RRF investments show that it has the potential to increase EU real GDP, as my colleague mentioned before, up to 1.4% in 2026 above a scenario with NextGenerationEU.
While the peak GDP effect for the EU would materialize in 2026, sustained impact is estimated to continue in the following years.
Where the evidence is not sufficient, the Commission will request the Member States to provide it during the assessment period. The length of the assessment period will not be extended, however, in this final stretch and given the payment deadline by 31st of December. It is not possible for the Commission to stop the clock during the assessment period. It is also important to note that any additional evidence must refer to actions implemented before 31st of August 2026, the deadline for implementation. In case the evidence remains missing or insufficient at the time of the assessment, the Commission will consider the milestone or target as not satisfactorily fulfilled.
We would then inform the Member States and withhold the amount of payment related to the milestones or targets while it launches a reduction procedure. Thank you.
Valdis Dombrovskis
Yes, thank you very much for those questions and also for the Parliament's report on the RRF and lessons learned for the next MFF and NRPP. Well, some elements, obviously now the MFF proposal and also proposal for how the national and regional partnership plans should be structured is now with co-legislators, so there is a scope for discussion and possible improvements, and from Commission's side we are open for those discussions. You mentioned also the specific point of reducing bureaucracy. There, I would say one element with which RRF has struggled is that in a sense its performance-based nature has not been fully recognized. So on one hand, performance-based nature of instrument means that Member States need to report on achieving milestones and targets.
And if they perform, if they achieve milestones and targets, we are doing the disbursements to the Member States. But as we see in parallel, we had been pushed to have more and more also cost reporting. So as a result, right now we have a double reporting for Member States.
They need to report both on performance based on milestones and targets, but increasingly they had to report also on costs. So that's probably one lesson we also need to learn and reflect whether we want to duplicate this double reporting also in the next MFF, just to respond to one of those specific points. Well, in terms of how we are doing this assessment of last payment requests, I think Executive Vice-President Dombrovskis was already quite detailed on this. But the point is indeed we are right now in end game, so we are not further in a position to extend deadlines. We will not be running stop-the-clock procedures.
So if we will conclude by the end of the assessment that certain milestones and targets are not met, we will start reduction procedures. Member states will have possibility to react on this, to provide additional evidence.
But this evidence indeed will have to reflect actions taken prior to 31st of August because that was the deadline by which all milestones and targets had to be had to be met. And as a as a rule, we are aiming to finalize all payments and disburse all payments by year end. And only hopefully small amounts linked with this reduction procedure and additional deadline for Member States to provide additional evidence where Member States will have two months may bring us into early 2027, but we hope that those are going to be minor amounts. Thank you.
Julien Sanchez
Merci, Madame la Présidente. Monsieur le Vice-Président exécutif, Monsieur le Commissaire. Alors, je sais bien que vous n'étiez pas présent au moment du lancement de NextGenerationEU. Néanmoins, à quelques semaines de la clôture de la Facilité pour la reprise et la résilience, la Commission européenne doit rendre des comptes. Après des centaines de milliards d'euros décaissés et une dette que les contribuables devront rembourser pendant des décennies, comment expliquer qu'il subsiste encore autant d'incertitudes sur la destination réelle des fonds, leurs bénéficiaires effectifs et les résultats concrètement obtenus ?
Les charges d'intérêt de NextGenerationEU, tout d'abord, pour 2021-2027, sont passées d'une estimation initiale de 14,9 milliards à 28 milliards au final. On parle de 149,3 milliards qui seront à rembourser sur le prochain CFP. Donc quel sera le coût total de cette dette jusqu'en 2058 ?
Combien les contribuables devront-ils encore payer pour ce mécanisme ? Et comment justifiez-vous de vouloir reproduire ce modèle de la FRR dans le prochain cadre financier alors que les résultats définitifs ne sont pas encore connus et que la Cour des comptes continue de relever des faiblesses dans les contrôles ? Avant de proposer de nouveaux emprunts communs, la Commission ne devrait-elle pas d'abord rendre des comptes sur l'utilisation des centaines de milliards déjà empruntés ? Concernant la transparence également dans l'utilisation des fonds, comment prétendre garantir la traçabilité de centaines de milliards d'euros lorsque les obligations de publication ne couvrent qu'une partie des acteurs intervenant dans leur utilisation ? On nous parle seulement des 100 principaux bénéficiaires finaux par pays.
La Commission est-elle aujourd'hui capable d'identifier précisément les entreprises qui ont effectivement reçu ces fonds ? S'engage-t-elle à publier tout cela parce qu'aujourd'hui nous qui sommes parlementaires nous n'avons toujours accès à rien ? Et ça pose quand même problème en termes de transparence, ça nous semble assez anormal. Et donc comment la Commission peut évaluer sérieusement les risques de conflit d'intérêt, de concentration des financements ou de détournement des fonds sans disposer d'une vision suffisamment complète de leur destination finale ? Je vous remercie.
Thank you, Chair.
Enikő Győri
First of all, I warmly welcome that seemingly my country, Hungary, can finally get access to the frozen RRF money that the Hungarian people and businesses have been entitled for for several years. Of course, we are still waiting for the Commission evaluation and the Council decision. And Commissioners, I very much hope that you agree with me that this decision has to come with full transparency. And after the evaluation deadline, and this is where my first question comes, can you commit that you will publish in detail all the implemented milestones taken by the new Hungarian government? Because the Hungarian people deserve to know what the price for getting these funds is.
What we know is, and I'm quoting here the EP Research Centre paper, that the new plan is much briefer in its description of measures and has fewer milestones and targets. Under the previous government, the Commission demanded extensive commitments and detailed requirements to unblock the money.
You even wanted to see how the newly adopted laws under the previous government would be applied in practice. Now, a revised plan with fewer milestones and targets and with less transparent descriptions has received the seemingly green light. Why were these requirements expected from the previous government, but apparently not expected from the new government? How can we be sure that you are not applying double standards? And what commitments did the new Hungarian government undertaken exactly in exchange for the Commission approval, if the vast majority of the super milestones, as the e-government paper says, are almost identical in the new plan?
Which specific measures, milestones, or targets were changed, waived, or reinterpreted compared to the previous government's plan? And another question, a little addition to what my colleague Julien has asked concerning the interest repayment obligation. The original figure was almost 15 billion, and now the new figure, the final figure, is almost the double. I'm finishing, I'm finishing. So isn't that frightening that even the new MFF 8.5 million would go only for interest repayment?
So I would like to know your feelings on that. Thank you.
Raffaele Fitto
The first question was about the repayment of Next Generation and the role of Next Generation. And I would like to start from the point about that this program support is provided in the form of loans, as you know, and grants to Member States under a number of different programs, most notably the RRF. Next Generation repayment will start as 2028. The Own Resources Decision requires that it is fully repaid by 2058. Next Generation EU loans with a maximum amount of about 291 billion euro will be repaid by the borrowing Member States.
And Next Generation grants to Member States and payments to the EU budget to reinforce some EU policies with a maximum amount of about 421 billion euro will be repaid by the EU budget. Under the MFF proposal, a fixed annual amount of 24 billion euro in current prices for debt service of the Next Generation EU, including both the interest and the principal amounting to 168 billion euro over the period 2028-2034.
The amount used for interest payments depends on the cost of future refinancing activities. The part that is not needed for interest payments will be used to repay the principals. About transparency, ensuring transparency is a top priority of the Commission. Regarding the obligation to report on the 100 largest final recipients under the RRF, the Commission issued additional written guidance in autumn 2024 to ensure Member States are fully aware of what is expected from them. In April 2025, we organized a meeting of the RRF expert group where we answered remaining questions and Member States shared best practice.
In addition, the Commission carries out plausibility checks of the list provided by the Member States and follows up with them in case of issues. This has led to corrections in a few cases. Member States must update their list of the 100 largest final recipients twice per year. Where updates are delayed, the Commission follows up diligently. In 2026, 25 Member States updated their data in the first reporting round.
The remaining Member States received a reminder. About Hungary, the Commission assesses Hungary's effort to strengthen the rule of law in three parallel procedures: the general budget conditionality, the implementation of the RRP, and the horizontal enabling condition on the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights in the context of cohesion policy. No payment following a disbursement request under the RRF is possible without the fulfillment of all audit and control milestones. The RRF super milestones are closely linked to the remedial measures adopted under the conditionality regulation as they address to a significant extent the same concerns regarding the protection of the Union's financial interests. On 23rd September 2026, the Commission proposed to the Council to lift the protective measures adopted in 2022 concerning Hungary under the conditionality regulation as it considers that Hungary has addressed the rule of law breaches affecting the EU budget.
On 13th October 2026, the Council adopted the decision. Following the submission of Hungary's first payment request, the Commission is currently assessing the fulfillment of those super milestones in the framework of Hungary's payment request on the basis of the applicable RRF legal framework and the evidence provided by the Hungarian authorities.
Valdis Dombrovskis
Yes, thank you very much. Maybe just to add some points and considerations. Executive Vice-President Fitto already outlined the repayment schedule which we proposed for the next multiannual financial framework, so with a fixed amount of 24 billion euros covering both principal and interest rate payments. Well, more conceptually, it's clear that borrowing costs money. And that's obviously something which needs to be kept in mind when deciding on specific funding instruments, whether it's at national level or at the EU level.
I think from that point of view, that was clear by the time Commission proposed and co-legislators decided to go ahead with the Recovery and Resilience Facility. Any instrument based on a common borrowing will have to also service to provide service costs and interest costs for this common borrowing.
You mentioned that the estimates for those costs have gone up. Indeed, if you look at the interest rate environment we are operating now, we are operating in substantially higher interest rate environments than at the beginning of Recovery and Resilience Facility and that is reflected on the actual borrowing costs. It's true for European Commission, it's true also for pretty much all member states. We see that the interest rates for also sovereign debt borrowing had gone up in a member state, so it's inevitably reflected also in our borrowing concerning the RRF. Then, well, to come to specific questions on Hungary, there again I think Executive Vice-President Dombrovskis provided already in detail the state of play.
So we are currently doing the assessment of Hungary's basically first and final payment request. This payment request includes, and it has to include, all so-called super milestones, meaning audit and control milestones to protect EU's financial instruments, to strengthen judicial independence and so on, without which disbursements are not possible. And also all other milestones and targets. So all in all, we are assessing 127 milestones and targets in Hungarian plan. Well, you mentioned that a revised plan has lower number of milestones and targets and also simplified milestones and targets.
That's fully in line with the guidance we had been providing to member states in a view towards closure the RRF. We were actually urging all member states to provide revised recovery and resilience plans where on one hand to assess critically which investment projects can be concluded by the end of RRF timeline, which cannot, to remove the projects which cannot be concluded or to stage them and so on and so forth, and also to simplify and streamline the plans.
So on average the number of milestones and targets to assess had gone down by some 20% and that's across all member states. So we had been also working towards certain simplification and streamlining of the plans and that has been the case also for Hungary, but like also for other member states, important element was that we are not losing the overall level of ambition in the plan. Thank you.
Bogdan Rzońca
The coordinator first. Thank you. Dobrze. Dobrze, ja kilka zdań po polsku powiem. Otóż no bardzo panowie komisarze poprawili mi samopoczucie dlatego, że tymi swoimi wypowiedziami, dlatego że przeczytałem 11 raportów przygotowanych przez Europejski Trybunał Obrachunkowy, bo tyle ich się ukazało dotyczących RRF-u.
Jeszcze był 12 dokument, który o tym też mówi. No i w każdym z tych raportów na przestrzeni lat 22, 23, 24, 25 zawsze były bardzo poważne spostrzeżenia i zastrzeżenia do tego, co się dzieje z RRF-em. No przypominam, że takie główne zastrzeżenie to było takie, iż krajowe systemy kontroli są bardzo słabe i Europejski Trybunał pytał się, no na jakiej podstawie Komisja Europejska ocenia te wszystkie projekty. No jak teraz słyszę, że jest tak dobrze, to czyżby Europejski Trybunał nie miał racji, że po prostu wytykał tą kwestię Komisji Europejskiej? Było zastrzeżenie, że są, to jest raport z 2024 roku, że są mizerne efekty nakładów na cyfryzację, bardzo duże przerosty związane z wydatkowaniem pieniędzy na zieloną transformację.
Wiele, wiele miliardów podobno poszło poza kontrolą i to wszystko jest w dokumentach Europejskiego Trybunału Obrachunkowego.
A ja słyszę, że tu w tej chwili już jest wszystko dobrze, więc chciałbym prosić o taką odpowiedź, czy tak aż bardzo Trybunał się mylił, czy czy tak wiele się dobrego zadziało, że już jesteście jesteśmy na no fenomenalnym miejscu i są same sukcesy, bo tak na pewno nie jest. I pytanie takie o Polskę, była afera z zakupem z tych pieniędzy jachtów, solarów, różnego rodzaju saun. To była afera, która przetoczyła się przez całą Polskę, bo koledzy pana premiera obecnego kupowali te te rzeczy. Czy jest ta informacja o tym w Komisji Europejskiej? Dziękuję bardzo.
Aurore Lalucq
Thank you. Do we have a second speaker for ECR or not at the end of the day? No? No? No.
Okay.
Gaetano Pedulla'
Grazie commissari per questo nuovo confronto. Riprendo un po' la domanda fatta all'onorevole Lupo rispetto all'insegnamento che traete dallo strumento. Il dato che dite positivo, questo dato dell'1,4% di PIL aggiuntivo rispetto all'assenza dello strumento è importante e quindi ci fate comprendere che siete convinti che serva un nuovo strumento.
Però il vicepresidente Fitto ci dice se ne sta parlando, attendiamo di comprendere gli orientamenti generali. Io invece credo che sia interessante per questo Parlamento, per i cittadini, capire qual è la vostra idea, l'idea dei commissari economici di questa Commissione. Visto che tra l'altro la Commissione non ha dato seguito a una richiesta all'unanimità praticamente di questo Parlamento di prorogare i piani del PNRR. Qual è la vostra idea? Occorre un nuovo strumento?
Siete per politiche espansive nuove oppure no? Siete per un progetto di austerità? L'Europa sta bruciando dalla Spagna, la Francia, l'Italia per il disagio economico e sociale, non si merita una risposta d'euroburocrati. Quindi spero che vogliate dirci come la pensate. Una seconda domanda molto secca sulle restituzioni.
Oltre al balzo degli interessi che sicuramente è un tema, ci sono altre criticità? Ci sono ostacoli politici o altro? Grazie.
Raffaele Fitto
Yes, I would like to start from the first questions about the cooperation with ECA because I would like to talk about cooperation with ECA.
The Commission and ECA have a close and constructive collaboration on a series of audits undertaken by the ECA. Within the past five years, the ECA has published 15 special reports and two reviews focused on the RRF, as well as five annual reports chapters on the RRF. With this in mind, and given also its short lifetime, the RRF has been one of the most scrutinized Union funding instruments. While generally the more critical findings take the limelight, I would like to stress that the vast majority of ECA findings have, in fact, been positive. For instance, out of thousands of milestones and targets assessed by the Commission over the years, the ECA has only disagreed with the Commission's assessment of satisfactory fulfillment on a very small minority.
For instance, for 2025, the ECA disagrees with the Commission's assessment in only 1.5% of the 1,039 milestones and targets related to grants.
For most of the other critical ECA findings, the issues where it disagreed with the Commission interpretation are in fact matters of the legal setup. While the Commission cannot revise a funding program's legal provisions halfway through implementation, we consider we have managed to address most of the relevant ambiguities or interpretational questions in our proposal for the next set of programs, notably the NRRP regulation. Per la seconda questione, preferisco parlare in italiano e posso dire che, come ho già chiarito prima, la proposta della Commissione è molto ambiziosa dal punto di vista della dimensione finanziaria e c'è uno sforzo importante nel cambio della struttura del bilancio. Perché abbiamo messo in campo con la proposta dei nuovi piani nazionali regionali uno sforzo molto importante che da una parte tiene conto del risultato positivo che l'RRF ha portato con sé, anche dal punto di vista della nuova governance, ma dall'altra tiene saldi gli obiettivi, i principi e anche le modalità e il coinvolgimento di tutti quegli interlocutori istituzionali fondamentali nell'ambito dell'altra grande politica, quella della politica di coesione all'interno delle istituzioni europee.
Vorrei su questo fare solo un esempio concreto per allineare le due politiche in uno sforzo che la Commissione sta facendo e che nella proposta di bilancio trova poi una sintesi importante nei piani nazionali e regionali. Ed è collegato al fatto che da una parte abbiamo avuto gli effetti positivi di questa governance dell'RRF e dall'altra abbiamo messo in campo un processo di modernizzazione della politica di coesione. Due elementi fondamentali: il primo, la possibilità di utilizzare insieme coesione ed RRF anche nel passaggio dei progetti, è stato uno dei punti centrali delle nostre linee guida che abbiamo insieme al collega Dombrovskis presentato in Commissione lo scorso giugno dello scorso anno. E la seconda è la revisione di medio termine della politica di coesione, che è stato uno strumento molto importante, molto potente dal punto di vista della quantità delle risorse, circa 35 miliardi di euro, e anche del metodo, perché il dialogo con Stati membri, Parlamento e Comitato delle regioni è stato centrale. Nell'ambito del regolamento dei piani nazionali e regionali di partenariato della futura proposta di bilancio ci sono molti elementi che potranno essere approfonditi in questo ambito e ritengo che il ruolo del Parlamento sarà centrale anche nella fase di attuazione.
Valdis Dombrovskis
Yes maybe to come back to those questions of audit and control how to deal with possible cases of fraud and certainly we have strong safeguards in in place to deal with situations like this. So if you look at EPPO's the EPPO's 2025 annual report highlights 518 active cases of which 107 cases had been notified to the Commission related to to 177 related to the RRF of which 118 are active cases. And I would say the increased number of cases reflects also the now speeded up RRF implementation as we are now in the final stage and work is very intensive but in a case proportion of estimated damage in comparison to the total amount of the RRF funds remains stable and around 1%.
And it's also worth noting there was question on national audit and control systems that 86% of newly opened EPPO investigations have been launched upon notification by national authorities, meaning that the control systems in member states actually work. Then if we look at the work of European Court of Auditors and the findings of 2025 ECA annual report, so specifically for 2025, out of 1,038 milestones and targets for which Commission disbursed funds in 2025, ECA reports only 16 findings with financial impact.
So that corresponds to 1.5% of all milestones and targets related to grant payments in 2025, which is well, marginally lower than in 2024 when it was 1.6% of all milestones and targets. As in previous years, there are differences of views also with the Commission and Member States, so primarily concerning specific legal interpretations. So in 10 out of 16 findings, ECA disagrees with the Commission's assessment of satisfactory fulfillment, and for other six cases, it disagrees on the legal principles concerning either the eligibility period, which is four cases, or double funding, which is two cases. Regarding once again to come back to those Member States control systems, what the question was, this is also where Commission is not fully in line with this finding, noting that some of the audit recommendations addressed by the Commission to Member States in this regard were not yet fulfilled. So since we launched the audit work, we have issued more than 2,800 recommendations across all 27 Member States for audit and control, and by 12th of October of this year, 92% of those recommendations have been closed or preliminarily assessed as closed.
And Commission closes audit recommendation only where there is a sufficient evidence of implementation in in the given Member States. It takes time to prepare, submit and analyze and in it's only normal in this case that for more recent recommendations not all of them are closed as Member States are still working on their implementation. Thank you.
Johan Van Overtveldt
And thank you. In catch-the-eye we have first Ms. Kollar and then Mr. Aftias. So Ms. Kollar, please.
Kinga Kollár
Thank you, Chair. First of all, I would like to thank the immense efforts that you have been doing in the last months of the RRF implementation. I have a question concerning Hungary and then a general question as well. So because of the Orbán government, Hungarian citizens and businesses have long awaited the receipt of EU funds and the concrete benefits of the investment it should bring. And while I understand that the Commission must of course carry out the necessary assessments, it is equally important that there are no unnecessary administrative delays at this final stage.
Could you therefore give us a concrete update on when the money can eventually arrive to the Hungarian budget that was also left in very dire state by Fidesz? And forward-looking question is about simplification. The performance-based financing was originally presented as a way of simplifying EU funding. Yet the RRF has required extensive documentation, verification, and exchanges between Member States and the Commission, and also beneficiaries had to go through complex application and reporting processes. Does the Commission have any evidence that the performance-based model has eventually reduced administrative burden compared with traditional cost-based financing, especially for the final beneficiaries?
Thank you.
Georgios Aftias
Dear colleagues, I will talk to Greek. Κύριε Επίτροπε, θα σας αιφνιδιάσω αλλά θέλω απάντηση απόψε. Ζούμε την απόλυτη οικονομική καταιγίδα. Η Σύνοδος Κορυφής ανέθεσε στην Κομισιόν να φέρει προτάσεις για την ενεργειακή κρίση και να δώσει η Κομισιόν ευελιξία, δημοσιονομική ευελιξία ώστε κάθε χώρα να μπορεί να λάβει μέτρα ενεργειακής στήριξης. Κύριε Επίτροπε, αντιλαμβάνεστε, κύριοι συνάδελφοι, τι συμβαίνει αυτή την ώρα σε όλο τον κόσμο, σε όλη την Ευρώπη.
Απόψε, κύριε Επίτροπε, περιμένω από σας μία απάντηση. Μέχρι πότε θα περιμένει η Ευρώπη αυτές τις αποφάσεις; Ευχαριστώ πολύ.
Johan Van Overtveldt
Okay, before going back to Mr. Fitto and Mr. Dombrovskis, I would like to throw in myself two questions. First of all, the argument is made that the European economy is 1.4% larger than it would have been in 2026 without the RRF, baseline scenario without the RRF. Now, we don't know what that baseline scenario is, but since we had only 1.1% growth this year, I tend to conclude, but you can contradict me, that without RRF we wouldn't have had any growth at all. Second question, you were talking quite rightly about rising interest rates, substantially rising interest rates. We are now in terms of the borrowing costs of RRF way above what was foreseen initially.
My question is whether the Commission is considering to refinance some part or the whole part or some part of the RRF capital in order to smooth out the repayments. Thank you.
Raffaele Fitto
Yes, thank you. I would like to start from the question about Hungary to say that we have the same approach not only for Hungary but for all member states about the payments. And all member states submitted their final payments requests over the past few months and by the deadline of the 30th of September. This is the same approach for all member states. A few member states can be proud to have completed the implementation of their RRPs since their final payment request.
Either for most member states, the assessment of their final payment request is ongoing and will be completed so that the payments can be made by the 31st of September.
Hungary, like the other Member States, have to respect the process and we will see if Hungary, as the other Member States, will have the payment in this context, in this timeline. The impact of RRF on GDP is our provision and our numbers, but I think that it is not possible to say that in an alternative case we had a different numbers. But the 1.4% is the number that European Commission presented as numbers in this new context. But we have different situations that the first moment, since the first moment that we launched the RRF plans because, as you know, we have several crises from since the RRF until now and we have to now to to to improve this process and to close in the first in the best method.
I would like to emphasize one point that we mentioned before about the financial instruments that I think could be an important opportunity to continue in this process and also to contribute to the growth in the coming months and I am sure also in the next in the next year. And we have to continue in this way and I hope that it will be possible to close as possible soon the the negotiation for the next MFF to have the opportunity to start immediately also to give a continuity to this process and this investment that we have now in the in the RRF in the final part of RRF but also in the other programs that we have at the European level. Thank you.
Valdis Dombrovskis
Yes, thank you very much for those questions. So on first question indeed as is going not not going to be a delay because end of this year is a deadline for RRF also for assessment and disbursement of the payments to member states. So the answer is that Hungary will receive this payment by the end of the year like other member states. And there may be some limited exceptions in case we start some recovery procedures if we assess that some milestones and targets are not met and member states later provide evidence that actually they had been met when those payments may go into early 2027 but we potentially are talking small amounts and remains to be seen to which member states that may be applicable but as a rule by the end of the year payments will be done.
Then on the simplification on complex procedures, well yes indeed we are also listening to stakeholders. We had some implementation dialogues where we heard also certain positive aspects on this performance-based approach that you don't always have to squeeze project in some narrow category as it often tends to be the case with cohesion or structural funds and so. But it's true that there are also lots of complaints about complexity of procedures and we had been discussing earlier that part of this comes that indeed initial idea of the performance-based instrument was that the member states report on performance, but there has been lots of push by ECA, also by Budgetary Control Committee, also we receive many questions from these dialogues on cost reporting. And of course we are listening to this and but the result for member states is and for project so to say beneficiaries that they end up with a double reporting, they have to report both on performance and on cost.
So that's probably a lesson we need to reflect going forward in a context of next NRPP. Then on the question of fiscal flexibility, well that goes beyond the scope of Recovery and Resilience Dialogue, but I know it's a topical issue. So as you know, we have provided possibility to have additional fiscal flexibility for member states to strengthen their energy security, resilience of energy systems. So far we have received requests of three member states for this additional flexibility from Italy, Greece and Portugal. In case of Italy, we have provided our positive assessment that has already been accepted by the Council.
In case of Greece, we also have a positive assessment but Council decision is yet to come as application came later, and Portuguese case we are still assessing.
And in parallel, we are in discussions with authorities right now, both in Italy and Greece, on implementation of those flexibilities, so in a sense, what what exact initiatives will be covered by this flexibility. Myself, I had had conversations with both Minister Giorgetti and Minister Pierrakakis, so we're working on this and these flexibilities will be available to Member States. At the same time, of course, it's worth noting that we cannot pile flexibility on top of flexibility on top of flexibility, especially in current interest rate environment, in a situation where markets are, so to say, quite nervous in in general, and especially in high-debt countries. So that's something we need also to keep keep in mind. Then on the question on economic impact of RRF.
When we are discussing the 1.5% higher GDP, we are talking about cumulative impact, not so cumulative impact with the facility to compare without the facility.
Does it mean that this all 1.5% is attributable to 2026? It's accumulated since the beginning of the facility. So we shouldn't be comparing it therefore automatically with 2026 growth rate. And well, the question of, well, the borrowing costs are higher, as we discussed, whether we consider refinancing of some of the RRF debt. Well, we have put forward in our MFF proposal the repayment schedule.
Well, that is already some time and indeed interest rate environment has become more difficult now than it was when we were putting forward this repayment schedule. But now this proposal is with Member States and with European Parliament. So I can imagine that in the context of discussions on the next MFF, there may be some discussion also about this element. Thank you.
Johan Van Overtveldt
Thank you. If there are no more intervention requests by the MEP, then we can close off the meeting. I thank Vice-President Commissioner Fittó and Commissioner Dombrovskis and thank you all for being here.
Next meeting is on November the 3rd.
Speaker 37
But the moment you sit down, it's fucked up. Yeah, or you have to take another approach, which is to, look, you lift the arm first. Oh my god. Well, you just have to get used to it. No, no, no.
Anyway, let's swap it. Mine is fine.
Johan Van Overtveldt
Good evening everybody. Co-chair Hohlmeier will be here in a few minutes, but we can already start the meeting if you agree. First of all, the adoption of the agenda. If there are no objections, then I deem the agenda adopted. Okay.
Then interpretation in a truckload of languages. There is a webstreaming and it can be followed live via the BUDG and CONT webpages of our meeting. And then adoption of the minutes. Those of July the 14th are adopted unless somebody disagrees, which is not the case. Thank you.
Dear colleagues, welcome to today's joint BUDG committee meeting, which I have the pleasure to co-chair with Ms. Monika Hohlmeier, who will be here as already outlined in a second or a few seconds. Today's meeting will be dedicated to the consideration of the draft report on the proposed performance framework regulation, which is an important element of the package on the post-2027 multiannual financial framework, which aims to simplify and improve the assessment, monitoring, and reporting on spending from the Union budget through the establishment of a single and simplified framework for budget tracking and performance applicable to all Union programs and activities. Given their respective competencies for the Union budget and the discharge, the CONT and BUDG committees, plural, co-lead the negotiations on this file.
Ten other committees have already delivered their options, their opinions on the Commission proposal, and the rapporteurs from the opinion-giving committees have been invited to this evening's exchange. The choreography of today's meeting will be as follows. We will start with the presentation of the draft report by the co-rapporteurs, Monsieur Jean-Marc Germain and Niclas Herbst, who we also expect to be here shortly. Subsequently, we pass the floor to the budget and ECON shadows by political group for four minutes each. In the third round, we will hear from the rapporteurs for opinion for two minutes each.
If times allow, there will be a catch-the-eye slot with intervention of each one minute. Without further ado, let us start the introduction, and I give the floor to BUDG co-rapporteur Jean-Marc Germain. Please.
Thank you, Chair. Dear colleagues, I'm going to speak in French, so if you want or need to put your headset. Monsieur le Président, il nous aura fallu du temps pour Niclas Herbst et moi-même pour vous présenter ce projet de rapport. Du temps nécessaire pour nous mettre d'accord parce que vous imaginez bien que quand il s'agit de parler de principes fondamentaux pour notre Union, comme l'idée de ne pas financer des projets qui pourraient avoir un impact négatif pour l'environnement, ou de fixer notre ambition écologique à travers un budget et une cible budgétaire pour les dépenses liées à la lutte contre le réchauffement climatique et la biodiversité, ou à conditionner la dépense européenne au respect des droits fondamentaux sociaux et à la transparence.
Jean-Marc Germain
Ça arrivera rarement dans notre assemblée surtout ces derniers temps mais je crois qu'on peut dire que en tout cas c'est mon sentiment que ce compromis est un bon compromis. Bien sûr il faudra qu'il trouve une majorité puisqu'il a été scellé entre deux co-rapporteurs et qu'il faut que les groupes se l'approprient en tout le moins ceux qui souhaitent voter le MFF et s'inscrivent dans l'interim report qui a été voté par le Parlement.
Voilà, donc premier point, un gros travail sur des questions qui sont difficiles et des sujets de débat vifs entre nous. Deuxième élément, nous avons voulu aussi pleinement laisser le temps aux autres commissions qui ont négocié sur des principes qui sont absolument fondamentaux et pour lesquels en dehors de la procédure budgétaire, ils auraient été les commissions leaders. Je pense au principe lié à l'écologie où c'est la commission ENVI qui aurait été en charge, à l'égalité entre les femmes et les hommes où c'est la commission FEMM et aux conditionnalités sociales où c'est la commission EMPL. Et nous avons laissé le temps pour ces comités d'exprimer leur vision de ces principes horizontaux à travers leurs opinions et nous avons intégré autant que nous le pouvions dans le cadre de ce compromis leur travail.
Et puis troisièmement, mais là c'est un chantier qui reste ouvert, nous avons souhaité aussi que au-delà des principes horizontaux, les collègues puissent s'exprimer sur cette idée d'un budget dont on mesure la performance à travers d'un ensemble d'indicateurs qui sont décidés par le pouvoir politique que nous représentons. Je dirais que le texte que nous avons, au fond, il dit une chose très simple : nous voulons un budget qui obtient des résultats pour les gens, d'où les conditions sociales et d'égalité entre les femmes et les hommes, et dans le respect de notre planète pour léguer une planète vivable à nos enfants. Je vais détailler dans le temps qu'il me reste les questions principales et les évolutions principales par rapport à la proposition de la Commission. D'abord sur le principe DNSH, qu'il n'y ait pas un euro d'argent public qui puisse aller à des projets qui ont un impact significatif et négatif sur l'environnement. Au fond, après des débats très vifs, nous avons trouvé un terrain d'entente pour que ce principe soit simple pour les entreprises, pas ajouter la nécessité alors même qu'on a obtenu les permis environnementaux de prouver une nouvelle fois que les projets qui sont portés par les porteurs de projets sont conformes à ce principe.
Et aussi faire en sorte finalement, puisque le budget européen réserve 35 % de ses moyens pour lutter contre le réchauffement climatique, de faire en sorte tout simplement qu'on ait une gestion budgétaire qui soit saine et efficace. Et ça ne servirait à rien de dépenser de l'argent pour lutter contre le réchauffement climatique d'un côté et de l'autre côté de continuer à subventionner des projets qui ont un impact et qui conduisent à accélérer le réchauffement climatique. Et donc ce terrain d'entente, nous l'avons trouvé autour d'un principe qui a été proposé par la Commission d'ailleurs, qui est une liste de domaines d'activité dans lesquels il y a une présomption d'impact sur l'environnement et donc qui ne peuvent pas être subventionnés. Et à l'opposé, que tout le reste ne donne pas lieu à des formalités administratives et soit subventionnable, à l'exception de ce que nous avons souhaité, en tout cas moi personnellement à la demande de mon groupe, qu'il y ait une clause de sauvegarde pour les cas évidents où une atteinte forte aurait été portée ou pourrait être portée par un projet qui serait en dehors de cette liste.
Sur les conditionnalités sociales, je vais aller plus vite, mais nous avons souhaité faire une référence explicite aux objectifs sociaux de l'Union. Sur l'égalité entre les femmes et les hommes, nous avons souhaité traduire la méthodologie pardon de l'OCDE qui demande à ce qu'on ne se contente pas de mesurer les inégalités, mais qu'on demande au programme de fixer, en fonction évidemment de leur objectif, des objectifs de réduction des inégalités entre les femmes et les hommes. Enfin, sur la transparence et la lisibilité du budget européen, le tableau de bord unique proposé par la Commission à l'article 12 doit permettre de savoir où va l'argent, mais aussi ce qu'il accomplit réellement par ses objectifs de moyens et de résultats.
De résultats parce qu'à la fin c'est le résultat qui compte, mais de moyens parce qu'on sait que la temporalité du résultat va parfois et tout le temps au-delà de l'annualité budgétaire, mais parfois au-delà de la durée d'un budget pluriannuel. Pour conclure, chers collègues, puisque mon co-rapporteur Niclas Herbst est arrivé, ce projet pour nous n'est qu'un point de départ puisqu'il est un compromis entre nous mais qu'il faut qu'il trouve une majorité, que nous attendons vos amendements avec intérêt et pour construire cette majorité, qu'il reste aussi un travail, c'était un choix considérable sur l'annexe 1 et enfin que nous voulons garder la force de ce texte qui, comme je l'ai dit en introduction, est tout à fait important car, comme je l'ai dit au bout du compte, notre objectif est simple : faire un budget qui délivre, comme on dit en anglais, pour les citoyens et la planète. Je vous remercie.
Niclas Herbst
Thank you, Chair. First of all, sorry for being late. But Jean-Marc, don't worry, I only missed the first 90 seconds of your speech and we have met so many times, I'm pretty sure I knew I know what you were saying. So first of all, but I would also like to seize the opportunity and thank you for being open for compromise as you have pointed out.
That wasn't easy. It's a very technical, but at the same time very political file. And we tried our best to find some middle ground, as you called it. So, dear chair, dear colleagues, in the draft report we have focused on the work on the operative part of the regulation, leaving the work on the, let's say, recitals and the annexes for the compromise stage. So there's still work to be done to be sure that we conclude the work in time to make it for the December plenary.
On to chapter two of the draft report, the most important changes we have introduced are on articles four to seven, especially article five, the do no significant harm principle, which was one of our, let's say, main focus of our work. At the same time, we have also strengthened provisions on transparency and traceability. And please bear in mind that I'm the CONT rapporteur, so that is a very important issue for me in order to ensure that the Parliament and also citizens have an overview on how the EU funds are spent. On climate and biodiversity, you mentioned it, Jean-Marc, the draft report maintains the 35% climate spending target proposed by the Commission while introducing an objective for biodiversity spending aiming to achieve at least the same level as under the current MFF. So as in case for the current MFF, biodiversity spending should be adequately tracked.
The draft does not amend the specific climate targets for sectoral programs which were included in Annex III. And to this end, the draft report deletes the possibility of the Commission to amend this annex via delegated act.
On the DNSH, on the do no significant harm principle. Our amendments in this Article number 5 were guided by the intentions to set clear limits to the discretion of the Commission when applying this principle, to provide for limited and clearly defined exemptions to the DNSH application, and to reduce administrative burden for the beneficiaries. This is of course of extreme importance to us. So to this end, the draft report provides for the DNSH exclusion list to be established through a delegated act, which is important to preserve the institutional role of the co-legislators, and I think we as a Parliament should have a say. As Parliament and the Council would retain the right to scrutinize the list and any subsequent changes, and which will make the framework more predictable for implementing authorities, but again also for the final beneficiaries.
So the list would be exhaustive and activities not included in the list would be deemed to automatically comply with the DNSH principle and would not need any verification of compliance. The delegated act should also include carve-out criteria which specify the conditions under which activities should still be considered compliant with the DNSH principle and to ensure the consistent verification and application of the DNSH principle, the delegated act should be supplemented by Commission guidance. As regards defense and security activities, they will remain exempted from DNSH for, and I quote from our compromise, for as long as it is necessary to address the crisis situation arising from the development of the geopolitical situation. This provision ensures that the initial Commission proposal, which was general, is accompanied by an assurance that this exemption would be implemented for as long as the situation requires. The draft specifies in a clear manner, I think, that all existing information, that means permits, assessments, certifications and so on, shall feed in the DNSH compliance and that existing assessments shall not be repeated and that small-scale activities shall be subject to a simplified compliance documentation, also again very important for the final beneficiaries.
In relation to the sectoral legislation of EU funding instruments, the draft report allows for such legislation to decide the level at which compliance with the DNSH will be assessed: call for proposals, tenders, or individual operation. It further prohibits the Commission to introduce additional exclusions or criteria at the level of work programs or call for proposals. On social policies and gender equality, the draft report largely follows the Commission's proposal with some targeted clarifications regarding gender equality. The draft specifies that this principle should be taken into account and promoted where feasible and appropriate, you know this wording, in line with sector-specific rules. At the same time, it makes clear that applying this principle should not create additional administrative requirements for final recipients.
And I'll hurry up. Other provisions on transparency and traceability, the part starting from Article 8 onwards has more a content perspective. The draft requests that policy objectives are reflected to the maximum extent possible in intervention fields which are measurable, asking the Commission to map these links and report to the Parliament.
Finally, the draft aims to improve transparency of course by expanding the information available on the single gateway to include not only budget commitments but also actual payments and also strengthens the provisions on programs and evaluations, looking forward to the discussions.
Johan Van Overtveldt
Thank you. Let's go to the shadow rapporteurs for four minutes each. We start with Ms. Monika Hohlmeier, BUDG EPP shadow.
Monika Hohlmeier
Thank you very much, Chair. Thank you first to the rapporteurs and to their really presentation now of a common report that tries to address certain issues that are really in the Parliament's interest. First, as it was mentioned, the rapporteurs' changes to DNSH strengthens on one side Parliament's oversight with a delegated act, and but the second issue is that it must make the rules more predictable, less bureaucratic, and that we are not asking everybody for a DNSH control when it is really not necessary. I have the impression that nobody outside would understand us here in the European Parliament anymore if we are asking on minor projects and explicitly on if somebody already has passed a control, then a second time again the DNSH control and so on. So we must reduce bureaucracy.
We must further reduce, this will be one goal of myself in the amendments, we must further reduce the bureaucratic burden. We are not seen in the public as an institution that has not enough bureaucratic burden. We are seen as an institution that is overloading the population, the companies and our all people with a lot of bureaucracy. A single list of excluded activities spares many projects from separate checks. This is a real progress in cutting red tape, but we need clarity on when existing DNSH assessments are sufficient and when data can be reused.
Additional Commission checks must remain justified and limited. The exception must not become the rule, creating new legal uncertainty. Competitiveness must guide all EU funding. We should measure productivity, jobs, investment mobilized, innovation, sustainability and many efforts horizontally in the annex. DNSH must also allow investments in Europe's resilience: flood and wildfire protection, energy independence, strategic technologies and raw materials.
References in the recitals are not enough. We need clear, proportionate exceptions where necessary. Gender assessments must deliver more than statistics.
Monika Hohlmeier
At the moment, it delivers statistics and not more. I was in three hearings and in every hearing I received the answer: "No, it doesn't bring anything to the women itself, but we have statistics." Wonderful. I would like to see more than statistics because our problem is not that we don't have enough statistics, we have not enough in certain areas. I mentioned already one in the health sector, for example, in the research area.
We would need more in the health sector for women and not only to have a statistic that we don't have a specialized research for women. What do we gain asking whether a drone startup mainly or partly supports gender equality? We gain nothing with this.
We should prioritize tangible improvements for women over statistics and finally address representational gap in health research regarding women, children and the elderly. Parliament has an irrevocable right to information, documents and questions. But we saw in the RRF that this is not granted. So we must, I will further put some amendments on the very clear role of the Parliament as co-decisive institution, as institution with the right to have questions, with the rights to get answers and not to get answers as we got it in the RRF, for example, one ministry, three billions spent for biodiversity. Wonderful.
I would like to see what happened with the money and not only to receive a general amount. So we have to strengthen the role of the Parliament further and I think this is our right and we should ask for it.
Johan Van Overtveldt
Thank you very much. Next is Thomas Pellerin-Carlin for S&D shadow. Please.
Thomas Pellerin-Carlin
Monsieur le Président, chers collègues. D'abord merci aux co-rapporteurs. Le règlement sur le cadre de performance est essentiel pour garantir que le budget de l'Union produise des résultats concrets, mesurables et conformes à nos priorités stratégiques. Il ne s'agit pas seulement de suivre les dépenses, mais aussi de vérifier qu'elles contribuent réellement aux objectifs de l'Union européenne. Notre groupe est fermement attaché à un objectif ambitieux en matière de dépenses pour le climat et l'environnement.
Nous estimons qu'un objectif spécifique doit être fixé pour la protection de la biodiversité, comme c'est déjà le cas dans le budget actuel. Par ailleurs, comme j'ai déjà pu l'indiquer, les dépenses de défense et de sécurité ne devraient pas être exclues du calcul de l'objectif climatique car toutes les dépenses doivent être évaluées selon des critères transparents et cohérents et afin d'éviter que des exclusions ne réduisent la transparence budgétaire et ne créent une incertitude juridique. De plus, certaines dépenses dans le domaine de la défense et de la sécurité, pardon, certaines dépenses dans le domaine de la défense et de la sécurité contribuent directement à l'objectif de protection climatique. Par exemple, les investissements dans les électrocarburants permettent à nos armées de disposer d'une source d'énergie adaptée à leurs besoins opérationnels, mais qui est aussi produite en Europe à partir d'électricité et donc d'une manière respectueuse de l'environnement. Deuxièmement, notre groupe défendra et renforcera les principes horizontaux proposés par la Commission européenne : la prise en compte des objectifs sociaux, l'égalité femmes-hommes, ainsi que le principe DNSH comme on dit en anglais, donc le principe de ne pas causer de préjudice important à l'environnement.
Ce principe doit être appliqué de manière cohérente et rigoureuse dans l'ensemble du cadre financier pluriannuel.
C'est indispensable pour que les fonds européens ne soutiennent pas des activités qui compromettent nos objectifs environnementaux eux-mêmes soutenus par d'autres éléments du budget de l'Union européenne. Troisièmement, nous devons faire un travail de fond sur l'annexe 1 afin que les catégories de dépenses reflètent leur contribution réelle aux objectifs environnementaux, par exemple, pour ne citer qu'un seul exemple, le financement de capacités supplémentaires dans les aéroports n'est pas une mesure d'adaptation au changement climatique. Ensuite, du point de vue du contrôle budgétaire, il est indispensable que le suivi de la performance du budget soit rigoureux et annualisé. Lorsque les objectifs fixés par le règlement ne sont pas atteints, il faut que des mesures correctives soient prévues. Pour les fonds en gestion partagée, ces mesures devraient inclure, lorsque cela se justifie, des corrections financières.
La Commission devrait également fournir des informations sur la performance propre à chaque programme afin de rendre clairement visibles les progrès qui ont été réalisés et les difficultés qui ont été rencontrées. Pour finir, et c'est une idée qui me tient particulièrement à cœur, je pense que nous avons besoin dans ce budget d'adopter un réflexe d'adaptation. Le réflexe adaptation est peut-être mieux connu sous le terme anglais de climate resilience by design. L'idée, c'est que la résilience ne doit pas être envisagée ex post.
Il ne faut pas envisager la résilience comme une mesure corrective qu'on vient ajouter une fois que le projet est fini. Il faut concevoir la résilience comme un élément central dès la conception du projet, mais aussi dans sa planification et dans sa mise en œuvre. Les infrastructures financées par le budget de l'Union européenne doivent être conçues pour résister aux effets du dérèglement climatique : vagues de chaleur, inondations, sécheresse, retrait-gonflement des argiles, qui est un vrai défi pour tous les bâtiments d'Europe. Cela suppose d'évaluer ces risques dès le début des projets et de veiller à ce que les investissements soient adaptés aux conditions climatiques futures : 2030, 2040, 2050 et après, et pas seulement aux conditions actuelles, voire parfois, comme c'est souvent le cas en Europe, aux conditions du climat des années 80 qui n'existent déjà plus. La valeur ajoutée de nos investissements au niveau européen tient aussi à sa capacité à créer des infrastructures pérennes conçues pour répondre aux défis de demain.
L'Europe doit ainsi garantir que tout ce à quoi son budget contribue est à l'épreuve du temps. Cette approche est essentielle pour protéger les investissements européens, éviter les coûts de réparation, de remplacement qui n'auraient pas pu être anticipés et surtout pour assurer la continuité des services et notamment des services de sécurité civile ainsi que des activités économiques comme nous l'apprend le les conséquences économiques de long terme des inondations de 2021.
Il faut vraiment conclure maintenant.
Pour conclure, l'été caniculaire que nous avons traversé doit nous pousser à l'action. Et aussi brûlant que cet été ait été, il sera rien comparé aux autres. Et donc c'est pour ça que ce budget de l'Union européenne doit tenir compte de cette réalité et être à la hauteur des défis. Chaque euro dépensé doit contribuer réellement aux priorités de l'Union.
Jana Nagyová
Okay, thank you very much, Chair. I try to put my time on. So, first of all, I would like to thank both co-rapporteurs because in their work or in their report, they already included many of the issues which were of our concern.
So, I'd like to present three key issues which I have in addition and just would like to say that I am looking on this from the perspective that we here in European Parliament are supposed to be here for people, not against people, and we sometimes behave like this. So, these three key issues are: first of all, keep essential DNSH choices under the control of the co-legislator. Second is to ensure that this framework measures what the next MFF is supposed to deliver, it means greater European resilience and competitiveness. And third is simplification for the final beneficiary, which is the key, not simplification for the Commission, but simplification for final beneficiary. So, more details.
First, on the DNSH principle, we agree with the rapporteurs that Commission guidance is not the right solution. DNSH will determine which activities will receive or can receive EU financing and which cannot. It will therefore directly affect legal certainty, investment planning and capacity of Member States and beneficiaries to use funds. Therefore, we want to see that core DNSH rules and criteria must be placed in an annex to this regulation.
Idea of delegated act is fine, but we all know that Commission is well advanced with the preparation of the guidance and we don't see any real reason why we cannot put it in the annex of this regulation. It means that the European Parliament will keep its its hands on this till the very end. So, this is one thing. So, proposal what to do: create the annex now, request technical content and negotiate it properly. We know that the content is already or shall be ready before Christmas.
So, no reason why not to do it. Second, that the alternative to this is to remove specific DNSH regime from this regulation altogether and do it as a very specific and separate part of legislation. What we should not accept is a system under which Parliament endorses the principle but leaves Commission to determine its own substance later. This is something non-go or should be non-go for for all of us.
Taxpayers' money is actually strengthening European productivity, innovation, industrial capacity, and ability to compete. And third, last point is that simplification of DNSH, simplification should not become another rigid conditionality or an additional reporting burden. It has to be fully in line with other EU legislation, and especially we should have a look on the state aid guidelines where there is lot of overlaps. So it should be meaningful, proportionate way of tracking whether EU spending contributes to improved competitiveness across programs, and that's it. Thank you very much, and my time is over.
Julien Sanchez
Oui, merci Monsieur le Président, mes chers collègues, je voudrais tout d'abord remercier les rapporteurs pour leur travail et aussi de nous réunir ce soir jusqu'à 23 heures pour mon anniversaire. Merci pour cette attention, j'espère que pour l'occasion vous m'entendrez, ce serait mon plus beau cadeau. Plus sérieusement, je tiens à rappeler que l'objectif premier du règlement doit être de garantir la bonne utilisation de l'argent des contribuables européens et non de créer un nouvel instrument de pilotage politique des dépenses de l'Union.
À cet égard, la Cour des comptes européenne a elle-même relevé plusieurs faiblesses dans la proposition de la Commission. Elle constate notamment qu'environ un quart des domaines d'intervention ne disposent d'aucun indicateur de résultat et que le cadre proposé ne comprend pas d'indicateur d'impact. Elle souligne également le caractère parfois imprécis des domaines d'intervention et le recours à des indicateurs davantage centrés sur des réalisations administratives que sur des résultats concrets. Alors comment pouvons-nous prétendre mesurer la performance si nous ne sommes même pas capables de démontrer les effets réels des dépenses engagées ? Les rapporteurs proposent de renforcer les indicateurs et la qualité des données.
C'est nécessaire, mais cela ne suffit pas. Il faut pouvoir démontrer que les objectifs ont été atteints et que les sommes engagées étaient justifiées. La question de la traçabilité des fonds et du contrôle des coûts réels est tout aussi essentielle. La Cour nous met en garde contre les faiblesses du lien entre les financements et les résultats obtenus. L'expérience du plan de relance européen devrait nous servir d'avertissement.
Le respect de jalons et de cibles ne garantit pas à lui seul que les dépenses sont proportionnées aux résultats. L'amendement numéro 55 des rapporteurs prévoit une évaluation des coûts réels sur la base d'échantillons.
Mais pourquoi se limiter à une vérification par échantillonnage ? Et quelles garanties aurons-nous lorsque des écarts importants seront constatés entre les coûts réels et les montants financés ? Nous ne pouvons pas accepter un système dans lequel les paiements seraient dissociés de toute vérification sérieuse de l'utilisation effective des fonds. Par ailleurs, nous maintenons notre opposition à la généralisation du principe idéologique de gauche du Do No Significant Harm et relative aussi au budget genré, des règles qui ne sont pas pragmatiques et qui compliqueraient la vie à la fois des États membres, des agriculteurs, des entreprises et des collectivités territoriales. Nous contestons également l'objectif consistant à consacrer au moins 35 % du budget aux priorités climatiques et environnementales, ce n'est pas un chiffre.