“There is little chance that an agreement will be reached on the post-2020 budget during the current European Parliament term” Minister of State for EU Policy and Coordination Szabolcs Takács from the Prime Minister’s Office said in InfoRadio’s Arena show on Monday. Mr. Takács also spoke about the situation following the Sargentini Report.
“Even the size of the post-2020 EU budget is dividing the affected member states, for instance Austria and Holland would support a smaller budget, while others including Hungary think a decision on the size of the budget can only be made based on the required community tasks”, the Minister of State said, adding that for the moment negotiations are occurring at technical level.
“Also in question is whether it will be possible for member states to adopt the budget for the next programming period during the current institutional cycle. In our view, the chances of this are pretty small”, he said. Otherwise, “Hungary’s position with respect to this is that from our perspective the timing isn’t the main issue, but the quality of this budget proposal. The proposal is currently of low quality, and accordingly long negotiations are still required to enable its alteration so that it represents the interests of member states with a suitable balance and to a suitable degree”, he explained.
“The structure of the budget is also problematic, but there are parts of it that we are able to support, such as the fact that external border protection must be financed from the EU budget in view of the fact that the issue of mass immigration could easily represent a problem for Europe for several decades, meaning funding must be provided to enable the suitable handling of the issue. Another problem is the fact that this is only partially visible within the current budget proposal”, he continued.
“An even more serious problem is cohesion policy, in view of the fact that the Commission proposal would significantly reduce the volume of agricultural funding. This is unacceptable to Hungary, and also to a large number of other member states”, Mr. Takács declared.
“For the European Parliament to be able to ratify the agreement before the May elections, a decision on the draft budget would need to be made in the European Council by December. Member states must adopt the European Union budget unanimously”, he explained.
The Cabinet will be discussing the legal arguments with which it will be contesting the Sargentini report on 17 September. Legal redress can be requested from the European Court of Justice. “We believe the procedure is invalid, because it seems as if the European Parliament’s house regulations are overwriting the Constitution, which is absurd from a legal perspective. The Cabinet will be examining in what legal form and with what content it will be contesting the decision. What is certain, is that we will be contesting it”, he declared.
Mr. Takács also spoke about the fact that negotiations on the EP decision must also be conducted with Austria, the current President of the Council of the European Union. “We are looking forward to hearing the proposals of the Austrian Presidency. As far as the rule of law is concerned, we regard precisely the procedure consensually adopted in December 2014 by the General Affairs Council as a legitimate procedure in both a political and legal sense. Neither the Commission procedure not the Parliament’s procedure are legitimate from this perspective”, he stated.
The Minister of State for EU Policy and Coordination also spoke about how the procedure against Hungary will now progress.
He explained that if the procedure against Poland, and eventually the one against Hungary, reaches the European Council, four fifths of member states must vote in favour of the procedure’s statements, after which it can move forward to the following stage. According to the Minister of State we are still a long way away from a vote on Hungary; much can and will happen until then.
Proceedings are usually initiated against new member states, added Mr. Takács, according to whom the EP decision was the result of varying positions on migration.