A summit in Brussels on the EU budget for 2014-2020 concluded today with an unambitious commitment for 20 percent of EU spending to go towards tackling climate change. CEE Bankwatch Network and Friends of the Earth Europe called on member states' governments to build on this with national spending plans that ensure quality outcomes that work for Europe's people and environment. [1]
Ahead of this week's second round of negotiations to secure a deal on the European Union's budget for 2014-2020, environment groups CEE Bankwatch Network and Friends of the Earth Europe are urging European leaders to commit to high-quality spending in Europe for the next seven years, and not sidetrack with discussions on quantity.
With today's collapse of negotiations at the EU budget summit in Brussels, environment groups CEE Bankwatch Network and Friends of the Earth Europe called on countries to focus their efforts on agreeing a deal in the new year that has quality EU spending at the top of the agenda.
As European leaders gather in Brussels today for the EU budget summit, quality spending must be the focus of discussions if the future European budget is to tackle Europe's environmental and economic crises, according to environment groups CEE Bankwatch Network, Friends of the Earth Europe and Transport & Environment.
The latest EU budget 2014-20 negotiating text, published today by President of the European Council, Herman van Rompuy, contains the first sign of hope for a future EU budget that tackles climate change and helps support a sustainable future for Europe's 500 million people, according to CEE Bankwatch Network and Friends of the Earth Europe.Contained in today's text, the so-called 'negotiating box' for the multi-annual financial framework (MFF), is the appearance for the first time of a 20 percent spending figure for
Indicative figures for Europe's 2014-2020 budget offer little hope of a green future for agricultural and regional spending, according to CEE Bankwatch Network and Friends of the Earth Europe.
Brussels, October 11 - Today's voting by the European Parliament Budget Committee in favour of at least 20 percent of the future EU budget for 2014-20 going to address climate change, was welcomed by CEE Bankwatch Network and Friends of the Earth Europe.
The environment groups continue though to call for a 25 percent 'climate mainstreaming' figure in the final budget deal, to be decided next month, in order to boost EU action on climate change and create thousands of green jobs.
A European Parliament committee vote tomorrow (Wednesday July 11), with a major bearing on EU budget spending for the 2014-2020 period, must reject the re-classification of fossil fuels as 'low-carbon', urged environmental groups today.
Failure to do so would permit these drivers of climate change to be awarded potentially billions of euros of EU taxpayers' money intended solely for energy efficiency and renewable energy, say CEE Bankwatch Network and Friends of the Earth Europe.
Halfway through its term in office, the European Commission is falling behind in the race to create sustainable long-term prosperity in Europe, warn Europe's leading green groups in a critical assessment of the Commission's environmental performance since 2010.
The EU Summit, initially planned to discuss the purpose and effectiveness of the future €1 trillion EU Budget 2014-2020, was instead used to focus on a disputed attempt at a fiscal union and more quick fix bank bailouts – which to date have cost the tax payer over €4.5 trillion [1]. As governments put more money in irresponsible banks, they reduce their capacity to invest in a greener EU budget and economy.