The European Parliament approved the Community Budget for 2016, worth 155 billion euros in commitments and 143,9 billion euros in payments, this Wednesday in Strasbourg.
For the EP rapporteur, the social democrat José Manuel Fernandes, "this is the employment budget and the solidarity budget".
The legislative resolution on the EU's common draft general budget for 2016 was approved with 516 votes in favour, 179 against and 8 abstentions, in a plenary session where the Sul Informação was present.
For José Manuel Fernandes, an agreement was reached “which is positive, which responds to expectations, which responds to challenges, which is in accordance with the priorities we have defined and the priorities of Parliament”. “We took this agreement as far as possible. We used the flexibility instrument, 1.530 million euros above the margins in its entirety (…), we exhausted the margins for growth, for employment, for social and territorial cohesion and also for internal and external solidarity to help resolve the refugee crisis”, illustrated the Portuguese MEP.
The member of the Group of the European People's Party (Christian Democrats) also highlighted the changes that have taken place, in this final version, in relation to the first draft budget, namely the increase of 2,8 billion euros in commitment appropriations, "reducing the Council's cuts". "Also in payment appropriations, if we look at the draft budget before Amending Letter No. 1, that's 2.151 million payments in appropriations that we also got," he added.
The EP Rapporteur stressed that it was achieved that "the Youth Employment initiative becomes a priority for the institutions and continues after an evaluation that will be carried out in 2016". There was also a closer look at European farmers, who saw the amount allocated to them increased by 500 million euros, compared to what was initially foreseen.
“On employment, we have not forgotten to reinforce Horizon 2020 for innovation and research, COSME for small and medium-sized enterprises and Erasmus+ for youth. On migration and refugees, the external aspect is very present: we have mobilized all possible instruments in order to solve this problem internally, but also to act at the origin, and this package, which includes agencies, cooperation and development instruments, I'm sure it will also bring more security to the European Union and help refugees», concluded José Manuel Fernandes.
European Parliament and Council negotiators reached an agreement on the EU budget for 2016 on 14 November. This agreement was confirmed yesterday by the ministers of the Twenty-Eight and today by the MEPs.
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