Brussels: Europe and the Arabs
The Council of Member States today reached agreement on its position on the draft EU budget for 2025. In total, the Council's position for next year's budget amounts to €191.53 billion in commitments and €146.21 billion in disbursements.
“Next year’s budget will play an important role in achieving the EU’s long-term priorities and objectives. The agreement reached constitutes a good starting point for negotiations with the European Parliament, which we hope will allow the budget to be adopted on time. The proposed budget aims to ensure a prudent budget, leaving Footnotes to unforeseen circumstances, according to what was reported in a European statement in Brussels from Peter Banai, the Hungarian Minister of State responsible for budget negotiations, whose country assumed the current rotating presidency of the Union.
The statement also said: “In general, the Council takes a prudent approach. The Council stresses the importance that the 2025 budget continues to demonstrate the EU’s solidarity with the people of Ukraine and respond to the relevant crises.”
The Council believes that next year's budget must be realistic, in line with actual needs, ensuring prudent budgeting and leaving sufficient margins under the ceilings of the Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) to deal with unforeseen circumstances and address the challenges facing the Union.
At the same time, the 2025 budget should provide sufficient resources to ensure the implementation of EU policies and programs and allow timely payment of commitments already made.
The Council welcomes that the draft budget for 2025 is in line with the outcomes of the agreement on the review of the European Union's multiannual financial framework (MYFF 2021-2027), as set out in the European Council conclusions of 1 February 2024.
In this regard, the Council stresses the need for appropriate financing of the priorities set out in the revision of the multi-annual financial framework, taking into account budgetary implementation of all programs and reprioritization, where necessary.
Commitments are legal promises to spend money on activities whose implementation spans several financial years.
The payments cover expenditures arising from commitments entered into in the EU budget during the current and previous financial years.
In addition, the Council also issues five statements: one on disbursements in 2025, one on progress in implementing the mid-term review of the MFF, one on budget nomenclature, one on foreign policy financing, and one on administrative expenditures.
Next steps
An agreement was reached today between the Ambassadors of Member States to the European Union (Coreper). The Council aims to formally adopt its position through a written procedure ending on 13 September 2024. The Council's position will serve as a mandate for the Hungarian Presidency of the Council to negotiate the 2025 EU budget with the European Parliament. This year, the legal deadline for reaching an agreement on the annual budget is November 18, 2024, at midnight.
This is the fifth annual budget within the EU's long-term budget, the Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) for the period 2021-2027. The 2025 Budget is supplemented by measures to support the recovery from coronavirus (Covid-19) under Next Generation EU, the EU's pandemic recovery plan.
The Council approved the guidelines for the 2025 annual budget on March 12, 2024. The Authority presented the draft budget estimates on June 19, 2024.