Members of the EP negotiating team on the Multi-annual Financial Framework (MFF) 2014-2020 and Own Resources: Alain Lamassoure (lead negotiator), Jean Luc Dehaene (rapporteur own resources), Ann Jensen (rapporteur own resources), Ivailo Kalfin (rapporteur MFF), Reimer Boege (rapporteur MFF). on the EU’s long-term budget for 2014-2020 said that they are disappointed by the lack of progress in the negotiations on the MFF so far.

Based on the most recent texts provided by the Council, MEPs said that they “fail to see how an agreement could be reached in this evening’s tripartite meeting with the Irish Presidency and the Commission. Nevertheless, they hope for a breakthrough before June 25th.”

The members of the negotiating team consider the “small gestures” made by the Council on issues like flexibility and a revision “not acceptable,” as they prevent “any optimal use of the annual budgets under the new MFF and they would leave the newly-elected Parliament without any say regarding the EU budget until 2020. The same goes for the question of the budget deficit of this year, estimated at €11.2 billion.”

The MEPs said that they “also take it as a bad signal that the Council could not agree on a budget to accommodate the accession of Croatia, even though the whole scenario is foreseen in the inter-institutional agreement that is currently in force. EP negotiators would like this issue to be solved in accordance with the agreement.”

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