Parliamentary budget committee adopted its position on the 2025 budget, rejecting the Council’s proposal to cut €1.52 billion from flagship EU projects such as Horizon Europe or Erasmus+.
MEPs on the European Parliament’s budget committee have opposed proposals for cuts to landmark EU programs calling instead for increases when adopting their position on the Commission’s draft budget for 2025 on Monday evening in Strasbourg.
“We are asking for an increase to key programmes that we consider essential in the current context,” MEP Victor Negrescu (Romania/S&D), the Parliament’s lead negotiator on the 2025 budget, said of the position, which passed by 29 votes, with eight against and a sole abstention.
MEPs considered almost 1,000 amendments to the Council’s position on the Commission’s draft budget for 2025, which proposed cutting €1.52 billion from flagship EU projects such as the Horizon Europe research programme and the Erasmus+ mobility programme.
“The Council is attempting to slash the EU budget for 2025 to an unacceptable level,” Andrzej Halicki (Poland/EPP) told Euronews before the vote, adding that Parliament would not support this approach, which would reduce much-needed funding for Frontex, the International Security Fund, and education opportunities under the Erasmus+ programme.
Péter Banai, the Hungarian minister in charge of budget negotiations, said the Council’s goal was to ensure “prudent budgeting” and maintain a “margin for unforeseen circumstances.”
The largest cuts proposed are to the Horizon Europe research programme (€400m), the Erasmus+ mobility programme (€294m), and the Connecting Europe Facility Digital (€110m), a program aimed at enhancing digital connectivity across the bloc.
“Prudent budgeting is one thing, but we also have to remember that the EU must invest in our economy, support young farmers, and promote innovation through the Horizon Europe programme,” Halicki added.
The bloc’s 2025 budget is the first to be affected by the costs of repaying debt incurred under the NextGenerationEU recovery plan, resulting in some tough choices.
The Commission’s draft budget for 2025 already reflected some cuts from the previous year in programs like EU4Health and the Horizon Europe research programme. However, for Parliament, the Council’s proposal is simply “unacceptable”.
Negrescu claimed the Parliament wanted to deliver a “people-centered 2025 EU budget of more than 200 billion euros, asking for adequate funding for youth, farmers, SMEs, education, health, research, infrastructure, security and humanitarian aid”. The budget committee has backed amendments which row back on to restore the Council’s cuts and increase funding for Erasmus+, humanitarian aid, and disaster relief.
The Parliament must now ratify its final position in a late October plenary session, before so-called trilogue negotiations with the Council and the Commission can begin in November, with a view to the three institutions agreeing the final position by a November 18 deadline.
