Lords condemn failings in EU budget process
The House of Lords EU Committee which deals with economic affairs has written to the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, following highly critical evidence given by three prominent MEPs on a recent visit to Brussels.
In its letter, published today, the Committee has told the Treasury that the EU budget process is in need of an urgent review, that there is a risk that the seven year Multiannual Financial Framework deal will unravel, and that the EU should consider appointing a Commissioner for Budgetary Control.
Commenting, Lord Harrison, Chair of the Committee, said:
“The EU budget process is in an almighty mess. It is a source of frustration for the committee that we have to write once more to the Treasury, to express our disappointment at its lackadaisical approach to these fundamental problems. But having heard the strident criticisms from our witnesses, we feel compelled to urge the Government to spell out what action it will take to promote genuine reform. It seems to us that no-one is taking responsibility for these issues. If everyone continues kicking the can up the road, there is a danger that the entire budgetary framework could unravel.
We look forward to a response from the Treasury by 4 November.”
As one of the three witnesses, Dr. Ingeborg Grässle MEP, Chair of the European Parliament's Committee on Budgetary Control, told the Committee:
“We should have the courage to redo the whole budgetary procedure, which will become more and more ridiculous”.
The Committee's letter also makes the point that the UK's hands-off attitude to the failings in the budgetary process was ‘counterproductive and complacent'. This was echoed by witnesses who called on the Government to start taking the subject seriously and accept its own responsibilities to tackle the breakdown in the system.
The latest letter comes after the Committee wrote to the Treasury in the summer identifying a series of problems with the EU budget-making process, including a huge backlog of outstanding payments to Member States, the frontloading, or prioritising, of payments for certain EU programmes; and the use of an emergency pot of funds, or Contingency Margin, to make ends meet.
