The European Parliament charges against the cuts that are being considered in the next European budget

The cut in the draft budget presented on Saturday by Ireland, the country that presides over the Council of the EU in this semester, has not pleased anyone. The European Parliament rejects it because it goes in a completely opposite direction to what was approved months ago by the MEPs who form the majority that usually supports the Commission, made up of the European PP, the Social Democrats, the Liberals and the Greens. “It is a proposal that cannot form the basis of the negotiation of the next multiannual budget of the EU,” says a text signed by the leaders of these four groups.

“This would jeopardize the EU's ability to respond to the challenges it faces and reaffirm Europe's role in the face of growing turbulence around the world,” notes the text from the pro-European majority in the European Parliament. The argument is similar to the warning that the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, preventively launched last Monday before MEPs. From that speech seven days ago, it can be clearly inferred that the EU Executive did not like the Irish approach to negotiating the next EU budget either, the agreement on which should be closed before the end of the year.

The rejection of the parliamentarians has not been the only one that Dublin has reaped since it presented the 141,000 million cut distributed unevenly in the different items that make up the budget project. Nor did it please the countries that, like Spain, aspired to more ambitious accounts between 2028 and 2034. It did not even please the Member States that want even more austerity: Germany, Austria, Denmark, Finland, the Netherlands and Sweden.

To this group, the cut proposed by Dublin seemed insufficient, as they already made clear on Saturday. But it can almost be said that they were more bothered by the inequality in the cuts. Ireland barely cut from the spending chapter dedicated to the Common Agricultural Policy and Cohesion: 3.2% less. On the other hand, the reduction in Competitiveness and Defense policies has reached 13% and even more, 17.5% in foreign action. And this is what they have made known to the president of the European Council, António Costa, in a text, to which EL PAÍS has had access, which the negotiators of this sextet have sent. The Portuguese will be the one to lead the negotiations from now on to close an agreement that everyone says they want to have ready before Christmas.

The greatest reduction in the Defense or Competitiveness chapters is one of the elements that has also displeased the Commission, European sources point out to this newspaper. In Brussels, it has also not gone down well with the fact that all the sections intended to make the budget more flexible or have more room for unforeseen events have suffered decreases of 50% or more. When the EU Executive launched its budget proposal for the period 2028-2034, its president greatly emphasized that it was a project with wide margins of flexibility to be able to respond to a changing world.

As it is a budget for seven years, something extraordinary throughout the world, it is difficult to predict how certain scenarios will evolve, even more so if we take into account the time that elapses from the time the accounts are presented (2025) until they are finalized (2034). For this reason, what Ireland has raised on this point is one of the elements that the Commission regrets.

But of course the European institution that has the most elements to feel snubbed is the Parliament. When MEPs approved their position on the draft budget, they demanded a 10% increase on the 1.76 trillion euros that the Commission put on the table. Now, however, it is found that the Council is considering a cut of at least 8%. Hence this Monday, the four pro-European groups launched this lament, stressing that “a smaller budget will not make the EU's challenges disappear.”