Authors Iain Begg | Gabriel GlÃ¶ckler | Anke Hassel ... - The Europaeum

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terms only very slowly and as a percentage of total commitment appropriations is expected to fall from 36% in 2007 to 32% in 2013. However a large part of the expenditure on rural development, the second arm of the Common Agricultural Policy, goes to farming. This expenditure has increased rapidly over the last few years as it has been realised that the development of rural areas is a key to a healthy farm economy. Cohesion policies, designed to support the less prosperous regions and member states, account for around 36% of total budget commitments throughout the whole period 2007 to 2013. This allocation still contains a large proportion of funding for regions in the EU-15, some of which is transitional funding which will run out before the end of the current financial perspective. This suggests that cohesion policy funding could fall in the next financial perspective, both in nominal terms and as a percentage of total funding, although the accession of Turkey would undoubtedly lead to a move in the opposite direction. Spending on cohesion, like that on the CAP, has come under attack from some of the net contributors to the budget, because a large share of the funding is still going to regions in rather rich member states. Around 6% of the annual budget is spent on administration, including staffing and pension costs. The most important policy areas for the future of the European Union share the remaining 15% of the budget. This includes those policies considered essential for the future competitiveness of the Union, such as research and development, education and training and energy and transport networks, the burgeoning area of freedom and security and justice, EU foreign and neighbourhood policy and of course climate change. Union activity in all of these areas is increasing at a considerable rate, but this is not reflected in the budget. These policies are also those for which majority support can be found amongst the citizens of the member states. The structure of the budget and of the financial framework depend partly on the rules under which they are drawn up, some of which are extremely complex. Apart from the normal distinction between payment and commitment appropriations, until the Lisbon Treaty is ratified, the budget still differentiates between compulsory and non-compulsory expenditure. This insulates CAP spending from effective parliamentary criticism. The budgetary treatment also is conditional on the competence of the Union to act in certain fields. The Common Foreign and Security Policy is an 66 After the crisis: A new socio-economic settlement for the EU
example. As the policy is essentially the competence of the member states, there is only limited EU budget support. Interestingly when a joint action is agreed, the member states prefer to use the EU budget line rather than making the logically more correct charges on national budgets! There is little rationality to the budget structure; claims on it have arisen over the years without any serious thought to the logic of budgetary support. Own resources The resource side of the budget is even more complex thanks to the way in which contributions are raised and to the compensation mechanisms for member states which feel that they are contributing too much. The vast bulk of the resources are not “own resources” in the strict sense of the term. Indeed there are many who feel that the budget does not respect the Treaties in this respect. After the true own resources have been assessed, a share of VAT is transferred to the EU budget and the remaining requirement is contributed through a GNI key as explained above. These national resources are transferred by the member states to the EU budget through the specific decision-making processes in force in the member states. However those countries which do not benefit from EU policy expenditure but contribute in a major way due to the GNI resource are unwilling to exceed a certain net contribution. The British budget rebate (abatement) was the first of these reductions in contributions, but subsequently Germany, the Netherlands, Austria and Sweden have also benefited from a rebate on their contributions to the British rebate. This makes the resources side of the budget extremely complex. Net budgetary positions Whatever budgetary system is used, member states will calculate their net positions – the difference between what they contribute to the budget and what they receive from the expenditure side. For many years the Commission attempted to make this calculation difficult and certainly did not speak about it in public. Today the Commission publishes figures annually as a matter of course and the figures are used by different member states to berate the Union because either their net position is too negative or not positive enough. Net balances are however a problem because they often determine policy outcomes in the Union. Each member state when confronted with a new Chapter 4 – Alan Mayhew 67
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Authors Iain Begg | Gabriel Glöckl
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Published in 2009 by Policy Network
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4 After the crisis: A new socio-eco
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6 After the crisis: A new socio-eco
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Simona Milio is associate director
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Chapter 10 Simona Milio ...........
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Before the crash: the EU as a parti
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liberalisation. The City of London
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Page 20 and 21: confidence and world trade, to whic
Page 22 and 23: following the ECJ’s controversial
Page 24 and 25: signals are in place to promote a n
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Page 28 and 29: or indeed re-impose, what they rega
Page 30 and 31: Markets with rules The overall conc
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Page 34 and 35: Target financial stability The EMU
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Page 38 and 39: mortgage banks and the insurance se
Page 40 and 41: financial market rules. The ESFS au
Page 42 and 43: prudential regulation - though only
Page 44 and 45: initiatives vis-à-vis ratings agen
Page 48 and 49: Even if membership in a monetary un
Page 50 and 51: emained relatively contained to spe
Page 52 and 53: The second channel of functional sp
Page 54 and 55: But even so, the depth and intensit
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Page 58 and 59: in the EU show, authorities at the
Page 60 and 61: factors will remain prevalent and b
Page 62 and 63: centralised decision-maker. Similar
Page 66 and 67: (GNI), the interests of the member
Page 70 and 71: policy proposal asks itself what th
Page 72 and 73: ensure that a ceiling is put on the
Page 74 and 75: Reform of EU expenditure Spending 4
Page 76 and 77: The medium-term financial framework
Page 78 and 79: unanimity. The need to obtain the c
Page 80 and 81: therefore, was weakening the Europe
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Page 84 and 85: Since then, member states have name
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Page 88 and 89: a Treaty that not only ignores trad
Page 92 and 93: Firstly, they should include policy
Page 94 and 95: emanate from demographic trends. Ho
Page 96 and 97: Furthermore, the Lisbon agenda may
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Page 102 and 103: security, yet at a lower cost than
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Page 110 and 111: So what kind of social role for the
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to the European Innovation Scoreboa
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flexible labour regulation than cou
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to cope with change is germane to a
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average job tenure figures in the E
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(74), and road vehicles (78). On th
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Towards a less dogmatic approach Wh
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128 After the crisis: A new socio-e
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will be reinforced rather than cont
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Where do we come from? The EU agend
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However, so far the flexicurity app
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existing practices of wage subsidie
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minimum wage tend to have higher pr
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commitment for employment”, 18 un
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provisions for minority protection,
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eflected in the objective of the Li
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instruments have been criticised fo
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However, the countries’ planning
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ich developed country pre-occupatio
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emerging markets (indeed the rules
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Energy and carbon use depend on fou
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concentrate on the size of the cake
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esurgence of long-term unemployment
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22 Financial Services Authority (FS
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7 This idea is not new. The 1970 We
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33 Arpaia, Alfonso, Declan Costello
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9 See Garabiol-Furet, M.-D. (2006)
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Chapter 11 1 Victor, D.G. (2006)
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Authors Iain Begg | Gabriel GlÃ¶ckler | Anke Hassel ... - The Europaeum

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