MNI BRIEF: EU Budget Can't Cover NGEU Borrowing Cost Rise

Higher borrowing costs for the EU’s NGEU Covid recovery programme cannot be covered by the current EU budget, EU Economy Commissioner Paolo Gentiloni said Monday.

“The current MFF has an envelope of about EUR 15 billion for NextGenerationEU funding costs. This envelope is expected to be used up by this summer as a result of higher interest rates,” Gentiloni told the European Parliament.

The commissioner noted that new simulations showed total NGEU borrowing costs rising to EUR34 billion for 2021-2026 and warned MEPs that this could not be covered by “flexibilities” in the current budget. Gentiloni also warned that some countries are at increasing risk of delays in implementing their NGEU recovery plans and said that an accumulation of payment requests in the last years of the Facility should be avoided.

He said that the Commission would work with member states to make sure that they optimise the use of NGEU resources by the 2026 deadline for disbursements. This could be done in a number of ways, while staying within the bounds of the Regulation.