MNI BRIEF: 2024 Budget To Be Exhausted By NGEU Costs -Sefcovic

EU Commission Vice President Maros Sefcovic warned Monday that the 2024 EU Budget will be exhausted by the rising cost of funding its NGEU Covid recovery programme unless member states back the Commission’s call for an increase in EU spending, with the Commission looking for agreement on the top-up by year end..

Speaking following a meeting of EU affairs ministers, Sefcovic said that the bloc's “credibility is at stake” and said that the EU had “no more space for repurposing” existing spending programmes, such as NGEU, costs of which have risen due to high inflation and rising interest rates.

The commissioner said that while the ministers had reached a “general agreement” on the Commission’s proposed new EUR50bn Ukraine Facility, which includes loans and grants, the EUR10bn of proposed new funding for the new STEP programme for the support of green tech industry, biotech and other strategic technologies has left states divided. The proposed EUR10bn of public spending relies on leveraging private sector funding for a total target of €160bn but the EU’s frugal states have rejected this new public funding and have called for the Ukraine facility to be kept separate from the rest of the Commission’s long-term EU budget proposals.