Monika HOHLMEIER

Policy topics Monika HOHLMEIER is active on

What Monika HOHLMEIER has said (80)

• 2026-07-14 “(11:10:06 - 11:10:16): Dear colleagues, could you please calm down? Because the others are not reacting as your commission did not have so much time either. And on the Spanish question of the colleague,”
  EU political integration
• 2026-07-14 “(11:09:48 - 11:10:06): So thank you very much, dear commission. As I see that some questions of Daniel or some questions of Rasmus were not answered as well as of some Hungarian colleagues on con on constitutional We count colleagues. We count”
  EU Supervision of the Rule of Law
• 2026-07-14 “(09:58:32 - 09:58:48): Thank you very much, Commissioner Seraphine, also being at the end a bit larger because you know that there are some concerns on the MFF in relation to the RF. Thank you very much for these comments. And now we give the floor to Commissioner McGrath, on the rule of law in general. Over to you.”
  EU Supervision of the Rule of Law
• 2026-07-14 “(16:33:04 - 16:34:07): Thank you very much, Veronika. Good afternoon, dear colleagues. Today's exchange is an important step in the work of our joint committee towards the aim of adopting the report on the NRPPs. We are 3 committees, so it's really a challenge for our rapporteurs to get in line with everything with more than 7,000 amendments. So I wish our rapporteurs the best that they are successful. We are all aware of the timetable for this procedure. And I am glad that we already have achieved a lot of progress with the presentation of the draft report and the tabling of the amendments. Today's discussion about the amendments should help clarify the different positions of groups and MEPs and will provide an important basis for the construction of compromise amendments. This will be another intensive period for us and I encourage everybody to continue cooperation with a view to reaching a balanced and workable outcome. And now I would like to give the floor to Doragos because we are 3, the Regi chair today.”
  Cohesion and rural funding
• 2026-07-14 “(11:10:16 - 11:11:24): Raul, there was no answer. At the same time, so perhaps we could have, answers in written because on constitutional affairs, perhaps it's even better not to give an answer here because I even don't there are member states who have these kind of rules. There are or on on certain ministers or whatever. But I to clarify this in in the lead in the legal way, I think Tineke had this question in the other way around. So perhaps we ask our liberal legal service either to give us an impression about the legal situation and the commission either about this legal situation, how to give an analysis about this because I think it's very complicated to do this for a commission in 1 minute here in the commission. So thank you very much to be with us. Perhaps we clarify the questions that we would like to see answered. The colleagues can give it to us, and we give it to the commission. So I hope that everybody agrees with this type of procedure, and then, we could finalize this meeting today. Thank you very much, the commission.”
  Transparency requirements of EU institutions
• 2026-07-14 “(09:53:56 - 09:54:09): Thank you very much, executive vice president Fitto, for your intervention, and we are very happy to hear that you act fully in the line of the rule of law. We give the floor now to commissioner Seraphin on the budget. Over to you.”
  EU Supervision of the Rule of Law
• 2026-07-14 “(10:04:08 - 10:04:30): Thank you very much, commissioner McGrath for your final intervention on behalf of the European Commission. This has been all very helpful, and we start now our exchange. The first speaker from the side of the European Parliament is our colleague, Jean Marc Germain. Thank you, chair. I'm going to speak in French.”
  Multilingualism in EU institutions
• 2026-07-14 “(09:41:58 - 09:45:41): Thanks a lot, dear Andreas. Dear colleagues, today, batch and Konta are organizing an exchange of views on the conditions and procedures for unfreezing EU funds allocated to Hungary. As a procedural point, let me announce that apart from our standard streaming coverage, this joint meeting will also be broadcast live on EBS on European Broadcasting Service. Now I warmly welcome Raffaele Fitto, Executive Vice President for Cohesion Reforms, Fyodor Seraphim, yes, our Commissioner for Budget and Defraud and Public Administration. Michael McGrath, Commissioner for Democracy Justice, the Rule of Law and Consumer Protection. May I say it's very interesting that the Commission has time for Hungary, but not for the issue of Spain. I would like to welcome members from the Liebe, Econ, and Regi committees. You have been invited to this meeting due to your respective competencies. Liebig closely follows the situation of the rule of law in Hungary. Econ together with budget scrutinizes the implementation of the recovery and resilience facility, and Reggie is responsible for the common provisions regulation, CPR, horizontal enabling conditions. These tools are used together to help protect both the EU budget against rule of law breaches and the EU financial interests in member states. Since the entry into force of the rule of law conditionality regulation in 2021, Batch and Kant have attached great importance to the democratic scrutiny of its implementation and have organized several exchanges of use with the commission on this topic, mostly to take stock of new developments in relation to Hungary, which is the only member state against which measures have been adopted under the legislation so far. We discussed at several occasions the state of play of the Hungarian frozen funds last time on January 26 this year. As you are all aware, since the Hungarian elections took place on the 04/12/2026, bringing changes to the Hungarian political scene. On May 29, European media reported that commission president von der Leyen struck a political deal to free up 16,400,000,000 of frozen funds as long as Budapest completes key reforms and investments. Under the deal, 10,400,000,000 would be freed up to the RAF, 4,200,000,000 would be recovered from cohesion funds suspended under the rule of law conditionality mechanism. Another €2,200,000,000 would be de blocked under the CPR horizontal enabling condition on the charter of fundamental rights to restore academic freedom. Hungary submitted a revised recovery and resilience plan to the commission on the June 10. This revised plan aims at fully reaching the 27 super milestones, includes measures to reinforce the anti corruption framework and the protection of the EU financial interests. Following its positive assessment of the new RRP on the June 19, the commission made a proposal for a council implementing decision, amending council implementing decision of the 12/15/2022 in the form of €6,500,000,000 grant and €3,500,000,000 loan. On July 10, the revised plan was approved by the council. We are therefore happy to hear the commission today about these developments in Hungary.”
  Rule of law in Hungary
• 2026-07-14 “(18:23:30 - 18:24:41): So thank you very much. You brought up the rear of the whole discussion. As a conclusion to this meeting, let me warmly thank you for today's constructive discussion and for your thoughtful contributions, dear colleagues. I found today's consideration of tabled amendments particularly interesting. It has shown both the complexity of the issues at stake and the amount of work still ahead of us. Given this complexity, a broad and inclusive approach will be essential going forward. I want to highlight that a very good level of cooperation between the co rapporteur, shadows and rapporteur of the opinion giving committees will be necessary in order to find good compromises that can build a solid position of this house on the NRPPs. Ps. And what I thought it was very good, everybody was mentioning the regions and their importance. It was very interesting that here in house, the principle of subsidiarity is really living. So thanks a lot again, and I would like to give the floor to Veronica.”
  EU political integration
• 2026-07-14 “(18:00:28 - 18:02:36): You start to the next. Let's do under catch the eye. I'm Farhun. So I say something under catch the eye. Let's say the following. I think that the NRPPs in their current iteration are not taken are not taking various issues on board. There is a lack of legal certainty. Everyone needs legal certainty whether we're talking about agriculture or cohesion. Across the board, we need, legal certainty. And then we also have to have predictability predictability of planning. You know, if you're in investments, if you're in agri, it's difficult to have a sensible approach. The commission also seems to have forgotten that there are countries where there are regions that, form the whole nation. And, you know, in my own Germany, the different lender make up Germany. So each individual Bundeslund needs to be able to make its own decisions. The national level can't override the Bundeslunda. We saw in, Spain how things can turn out. You are told by the national authorities of a country that you should build kindergartens, but instead you wanted to build infrastructure. So we should have this done at local level. We shouldn't have things done centrally with a centralistic approach. That was a final comment. And I think that parliament has to, be involved. I want to thank all the rapporteurs. I want to thank everyone who's done their bit. I really want to say well done. Thank you all for making the effort to submit amendments. And we're going to hear for from the commission. Do does the commission want to say something about the whole process? You have the floor if you want it.”
  Cohesion and rural funding
• 2026-06-24 “(10:21:36 – 10:27:15): Thank you very much, dear chair. So first, I would like to mention that we have interpretations, so we should use them, of course. Otherwise, they're here for nothing. And I might as well speak German, therefore. Now member states are responsible for this. So, making reproaches of the EU is maybe erroneous. The issue is that at member state level, the implementation and monitoring is lacking, and customs play a major role, of course. Now the VAT directive needs to be revised so that someone can at least understand it. You need 25 experts to unravel and unpick the text and understand what it means. And now the provisions in member states are different. They differ, so that throws up very complex issues to do with VAT. Secondly, import controls when it comes, you know, at the borders, in our ports, not enough technical equipment, not frequent enough, 0.8% of all goods are checked. You know, from a technical point of view, it would be possible to check more goods, in particular imports, and therefore, there's no reason not to do that. And we need to give authorities the technical equipment to do so even if that might cost some money provisionally. Then illicit trade in cigarettes, carousel VAT, under declaring the value of goods. Those are the issues that arise to do with combating VAT fraud. Now in one case from China, we're talking about €3,800,000,000 worth of fraud. So we need to check more, have more controls, look at the value declared for goods because often the value is too low. And we need the border authorities to have the necessary equipment to deal with the illicit trade in cigarettes. You know, they're not brought in via sea in large containers. It's smaller couriers that deal with that. Of course, Europol needs its IT tools to be developed further, the forensics, and so on. They do the proprietary work. They pave the way for EPPO's work, and the police authorities and Europol need to do the spade work, and we shouldn't duplicate structures. But we do need to get it right. It needs to work in operational terms. So Europol really needs greater resources for the operational side of things, technical help and assistance, IT, forensic experts, and so on. And in pretty much all of the member states, it's the police authorities that carry out investigations, and they then indicate to the prosecutor's office who to prosecute. But like I said, the investigation is carried out by police authorities. I mean, it's organized differently from member state to member state, but we need to make sure that we put some order into that and so we can make sure that EPPO deals with really important cases, you know, not cases where there's 1000 euro at stake. You know, all of us can look at that, but we didn't set up EPPO to deal with breadcrumbs, really. They really need to be looking at the major cases, and we need to change their mandate so that we can take many of the cases away from them. The European Court of Justice had the same issue. They're being snowed under by many cases that aren't really that relevant, and they simply said, look. We can't deal with all of these cases. We can't reject them either. So I think when it comes to EPPO in future, we need to have another look at their mandate and change that so that they deal with the major serious cases and, you know, not with the smaller cases that ties up resources, human resources, and so on. That's something that the national courts and national management authorities and audit authorities should be dealing with or possibly OLAF. But it's the really major serious cases that need to go to EPPO, and that has to be included under EPPO. Now, of course, we also need OLAF's forensic capacity, so they shouldn't be dealing with the smaller cases either, but only with the major ones. So my recommendation really would be, and my amendments will be along these lines, that we need to look at the weaknesses in the system and change that. And it will be an interesting process, of course, because we need to bring the member states on board. Now, dear Karl, as a final comment, from a budgetary point of view, it's incredible that there's VAT fraud to the tune of €50,500,000,000 euro, and we're talking about 200,000,000 here. You know, that's peanuts. Sometimes we say we want more for Erasmus, this and the other, while we're foregoing €50,000,000,000 worth of revenue because the criminals are faster than we are, and that's something I can't accept. Thank you.”
  EU policy on customs fee on non-EU imports
• 2026-06-24 “Thank you very much, chairman. To be quite frank, I'm quite shocked at what the commission said. So I would like to point out that you have actually contradicted commissioners Gentiloni and Dombroskas who spoke here in this, committee. They said that the the cost can be traced, that the commission would publish everything, and they'd able to follow that up. So they said that to this committee that the money would be spent properly and that the commission would follow every single euro cent and and if money could be paid back if there wasn't sufficient transparency, for example. And both commissioners said that that would happen. So I do wonder, how do you want to demand something back from somebody when you don't even know how the money was spent in the 1st place? My 2nd question is about to the about the fact that my it's about milestones. Some member states have actually made changes on those milestones. The anti corruption prosecution authorities 1, the milestones hadn't been fulfilled there. The commission simply didn't do anything. And that's worrying for me because, obviously, you have milestones and projects behind targets and targets themselves, you're not taking these seriously. You're not verifying the costs when these costs arise based on certain projects. So based on the Lisbon treaty, the financial management and the proper use of funds are under the commission's remit. It's up to the commission to ensure that that takes place, and we have a discharge on this. So I can only support what Karla Tavares was asking. A 100%. If you're not able to verify the cost, then I'm sorry that I can say that what you are saying is in contradiction to what we were told by 2 commissioners. EPO is telling us that that fraud is taking place perhaps because of these methods. We have never seen as many cases of fraud as we've seen under the RF. And there are anonymous reports as well. In in Italy, we've had the public authority there. There's many corruption cases that have come to the fore, and we've seen cases in Spain as well. So I have to be very frank. You you come here and you claim that the financial regulation should be modified and that the FNLC should be used. Well, I can only say that what you are what you are saying here is completely incorrect. In the financial regulation, the commission declined to include performance linked to cost. So if if the court what the court of orders is saying is is logical. If you if you want to ensure this transparency, you would need to have the performance not linked to cost. So I have to say, I think that what you said is very unclear. And when it comes to the ECA, to what extent do you think that the financial regulation should be changed? And what exact points on that regulation should be changed? My 2nd question, does the court of auditors also think that there would be no legal basis to ask about costs? I think it's it's article 22, and I read that, and that is for audit purposes and for, requesting money back. There's me transparency for that. But but the commotion, as I commission, as I say, must comply with the Lisbon treaty because the parliament could then submit a complaint. But I'm particularly angry because the commission does not appear to have learned anything and is sticking to its points. Yet we in parliament, with a very broad majority for years, have tried to explain to commission that's not acceptable. This parliament is not just a a talking shop. No. This is a place where we have the right to receive full, comprehensive, detailed, reliable information. And unfortunately, the commission is not providing that information.”
  Accounting and auditing of EU budget
• 2024-11-07 “E-002469/2024 Answer given by Ms Lahbib on behalf of the European Commission The project Butterfly Effect aiming at tackling hate incidents was selected for funding under the 2022 EQUAL call 1 that supports projects fighting intolerance, racism, xenophobia and discrimination under the Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values (CERV) programme 2 . The proposal was submitted by a consortium made of six beneficiaries and coordinated by Cooperazione Per Lo Sviluppo Dei Paesi Emergenti Onlus. Submitted proposals are thoroughly evaluated against eligibility, selection and award criteria such as quality or relevance against the call objectives. Only the best ranked proposals are selected for funding. As elaborated in the Commission’s replies to questions E-006476/2020 and E-001741/2021, the Commission implements the mechanisms provided in the Financial Regulation for the award of funds. It carries out rigorous selection processes, including several different checks on grant beneficiaries based on objective criteria. The award of funds is conditional to the absence of any exclusion grounds as set out in Article 138 of Regulation (EU, Euratom) 2024/2509 3 . The total EU contribution for the project Butterfly Effect is EUR 467,858.14. Out of this amount, EUR 47,781.17 are allocated to ‘Dokustelle’. The detailed breakdown of the maximum EU contribution for each consortium beneficiary is available on the Funding & Tenders portal under the ‘Project & results’ section 4 . No funds have been transferred to the two organizations specified in the question (IMÖ and CAGE International), neither under the CERV programme nor through other EU funding programmes. 1 Call for proposals to promote equality and to fight against racism, xenophobia and discrimination– CERV2022-EQUAL https://ec.europa.eu/info/funding-tenders/opportunities/docs/2021-2027/cerv/wp-call/2022/callfiche_cerv-2022-equal_en.pdf 2 Regulation (EU) 2021/692 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 28 April 2021 establishing the Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values Programme (OJ L 156, 5.5.2021, p. 1). 3 Regulation (EU, Euratom) 2024/2509 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 September 2024 on the financial rules applicable to the general budget of the Union (recast) (OJ L, 2024/2509, 26.9.2024, ELI: http://data.europa.eu/eli/reg/2024/2509/oj). 4 Factsheet Butterfly project – Project ID 101084546 https://ec.europa.eu/info/fundingtenders/opportunities/portal/screen/opportunities/projectsdetails/43251589/101084546/CERV?order=DESC&pageNumber=1&pageSize=50&sortBy=title&isExactMatch =true&frameworkProgramme=43251589&topicAbbreviation=CERV-2022-EQUAL”
  EU engagement with civil society · EU policy on Islam · Transparency requirements of EU institutions
• “And that is what we call for in the report, that those resources be made available in an adequate, adequate way so that they can act in a timely fashion. And it's always, you know, a nice populist narrative. You know, any NGO is a dubious NGO. But how about an association of lawyers? Would that be a dubious NGO? You know, I would not tar everyone with the same brush. And I won't actually say any more than that on that. But. There is that link which needs to be there. And we can't change that because under the treaties there's no possibility for us to do that. But what is clear is that if the independence of the judiciary can't be guaranteed, there is no possibility to seek redress before the court and to obtain an independent court judgment. And that is a substantive breach of the rule of law. And if you Were to want to bring. A case for a certain claim. And if you want to go before the court, then you can do that in France, in Greece, in Italy, in Germany, everywhere that is possible. But in Hungary it's pretty difficult to achieve that. And if there is no rule of law, then there's no way to obtain justice. And freedom is always linked to the rule of law being there. And a budget can only be protected if you have an independent judiciary and if magistrates can go about their job properly. So that's what we're trying to achieve here. And then on transparency. Dear colleague Geisel, I'm very much in favor of transparency, but we can't. Move away.”
  Rule of law in Hungary
• “Deadline for amendments on both EGF reports the 8th of September, 5 p.m., and the vote will take place on the 23rd of September. Moving on now to amendment item 14.”
  Discharge of EU institutions and agencies
• “Thank you very much, dear colleagues. A warm welcome also from my side, from the side of the Budget Committee. The Reform and Growth Facility for Moldova aims to provide 1.5 billion in highly concessional loans and 420 million in Non-repayable supports grants and budgetary guarantees to Moldova. We can all agree on the need to support Moldova. At the same time, after Ukraine and the Western Balkans, this is the third facility the Commission is putting forward in less than a year without consulting or informing Parliament in advance. Article 122 continues to be applied, and we have to think of what we are doing with this. This seems to become a pattern and we find it worrying from an institutional perspective. Despite these circumstances, the Co-rapporteurs are doing everything possible to ensure a swift adoption of the proposal. But we do not wish to be rushed any further, and we certainly do not appreciate other institutions meddling in our decision making process. This is not only a question of institutional prerogatives, but also a matter of respect for democratic procedures in general. After these introductory comments, I would like now to pass the floor to our two co-rapporteurs for a presentation of the draft report. And the first would be from the rapporteurs Sven Mikser.”
  EU political integration
• “We are only working for ourselves. So everybody who is involved in legislative processes where certain technologies, economic interests are changed, they have per se commercial or economic interests, and they should be obliged to put their funding data. This is for me a very important point, because we see at the moment, because of these contracts, that there has been growing a kind of of, of, of, of networks that are really trying even to manipulate certain certain procedures in the legislative decision in council, in Parliament, and this was written in the contract. So for this reason, and I saw certain kind of funding via automobile industry story from third states to promote certain kind of technologies over certain kind of NGOs to get a certain result in the European Union. And this for me is an NGO with a commercial interest or economic interest, even if they don't stem from directly from directly from an industrial, uh, um, composition. So this is, for me, really a main issue that the transparency register really has to deliver transparency. And I would wish that the Commission explicitly, if they receive millions of funding, then they should be registered, to be frank.”
  Transparency requirements for interest groups
• “So first, thank you very much, dear chair. So I'm very thankful to DG presidency and the DG finance and that they are here with us this morning. Um, because I think in the last weeks you were quite occupied by other Things. And so I'm thankful that you made it possible to be with us today. I think that, um, that for the budget of the European Parliament, it is important to to show that we are effective, that we are using the money in a proper way and that we are proportionate in our in our kind of handling the things. Um, I think that the Parliament in the last year, really last year, has really improved a lot of things explicitly in the area of high tech. I'm it was astonishing during the time of Corona how quick we were. But meanwhile we tried to improve the things in this area. Um, quite largely on the other side. We have increased bureaucracy on a They're quite large, large and quite strong way. So we have to try to be better in deprioritization and to be effective at the same time. The year 2020 was a challenging one. The because the pandemic was over, a lot of work kept committees busy and the EU elections were around the corner. With a budget of €2.247 million and 18.7 of heading seven of the MFF. We were under the 20% threshold, but Parliament had plenty of resources to cover its really vast portfolio. Um, but as a good tradition checks if the money was spent efficiently, making sure that all activities of Parliament were covered and everyone managed to fulfill their task with the funds given to them. So for today, for the hearing, just first of DG presidency and then after Later of D.G. Finn's. I'm very thankful to both that they are here and present. Um, regarding explicitly to the challenges they were facing in the last weeks.”
  Discharge of EU institutions and agencies
• “Perhaps I can add on my questions to you. Any overview of the implications in the economic sphere? How really did our money from the European Union ameliorate the economic and social situation? Not starting from the point of corona, to be frank, because the normal recovery after pandemic situation is not something that we saw. There is more tourism, yes, it's clear after corona there is more tourism, so this is not a plus. It is not stemming from the European money. But if you compare it with the situation of the year perhaps before corona, it would be interesting to see what kind of impact it has. Secondly, could you provide us with a list how many times the plans, national plans of every member state, were changed since twenty twenty-one? Because I have the impression that this is a kind of seven-year—sorry to say—socialist planning. Seven years of planning. This was used for planification. Seven years, and then the plan does not work, then again we make a plan, then again the plan does not work, then we again make a plan. So we are always making plans, plans, plans that are not working, and then we change the plans. This is something that we saw in the Parliament together in every group, including the social democrats, critically, because this type of planning does not reflect the developments of the time. These would be my questions.”
  EU fiscal rules and oversight of national budgets
• “Thanks a lot, chair. So, um, I try to go quickly through all the agencies. That's not so easy. So if I miss something, uh, don't, uh, don't be irritated. It's not possible to mention everything. And, uh, to explain everything first. Um, the overall audit outcome. Um, unqualified opinions by Echa on the reliability of the accounts for all EU agencies. Unqualified opinions on the legality and regularity of revenue for all agencies, and an unqualified opinion on payments was ensured for all agencies except European Labour Authority, because in the former case, the only agency with qualified opinions on payments um, there were problems with the procurements. But I will refer to procurements later. Um. The court was concluding that the overall financial risk remains generally low and risk to sound. Financial management remains medium, consistently linked to public procurement weaknesses that were found in 21 agencies. This is why I will talk about this a little bit later. Um, first one case where I would like to add something to my report after the talks with Cedefop, um, I saw that there was a long term legal dispute with a former staff member whose contract was not renewed in 2017 and the legal cases go till today and are still not finalised.”
  Accounting and auditing of EU budget
• “So thank you so much dear Yuri Ratas. Any further comments. So I don't see it as the Commission plans for the future to respect in fully the wisdom of this parliamentary procedure and of the Parliament. I hope that this will be changing. Some proposals of the MFF that don't seem to be related to this principle. So the deadline for amendments is the 10th of September at 12:00. Um, and as there are no further comments, I think we can finalize our meeting now. Thank you very much. And, um, we will meet as a joint committee on Monday, on the 8th of September in Strasbourg and as budget Committee on the 22nd and 23rd of September. Um, if there are no further remarks, the meeting is closed. Group coordinators. Uh, we will meet at 11:00, I think, here in this room again. Thank you very much. Perfect.”
  Discharge of EU institutions and agencies
• “Thank you very much I have two or three comments myself and then I'll go further. Firstly I'd like to warmly thank you for your perspective but I have the I feel that you have a rather centralistic perspective one from Paris and Berlin and Bavaria a bit sensitive about this sort of thing so we don't want everything to be centralized. I'm looking at faces of colleagues and I see the effect I'm having. First the regions are not managing authority they are autonomous parliament in many countries and they're being completely bypassed here they have no more decision making powers here they just receive recommendations and that can't work and this also breaches the subsidiarity principle Lisbon treaty and others. Those working in the regions are the most successful in the coalition policy those in the central locations are those who are the least successful is the case so seven year plans. Secondly in the budget control committee we've had see all these projects go beyond seven years so smaller projects can't plan to that term so that reminds me of the old socialist economies sorry but if you don't have a plan that doesn't work you make a new plan that doesn't work either and then you make a new plan and this this is the same you exchange the swap out the plans and at the end you can't even see whether the plans were national budget plans which would could be rebranded as European plans that often happened but I will ask you please this get rid of this central centralistic lens be it that people in Paris or Berlin or Madrid know best how to develop a region and make it competitive with bigger projects it's different our competitiveness is on defense and there I would have liked to see more about the content not just national but the more European perspective the umbrella common defense communication but there's no timetable and no money for that so so it sends to it's well intentioned but it seems to miss the point so I'm not terribly convinced by it all so could you just give do something for me on this Berlin Paris perspective. You have the floor.”
  EU cohesion/structural-fund architecture: consolidation vs ring-fenced separate funds
• “(12:18:15 – 12:19:27): Thank you very much, chair. So I'd like to join those speakers who were talking about the regulation of performance ores and RPPs. I think you we're lacking a legal certainty, the ability to implement and reducing simplification, reduction of red tape. So it's simplified perhaps for the payer but not for the recipient. So the competence it's up to the regions to make decisions about their money. They don't have to follow criteria that are national and supranational. So I think we have to make a distinction and recall the subsidiarity clause in the Lisbon Treaty. And with the regulation, there's no there are quite a lot of contradictions vis a vis the budget regulation, and there's not clear wording that are going to have a genuine digital traceability and not have the repaying of national payments. So there's really a lot to do to make and to improve this proposal.”
  EU cohesion/structural-fund architecture: consolidation vs ring-fenced separate funds
• “Then um, the link to the performance regulation. The proposed performance regulation establishes a single streamlined list of indicators and monitoring provisions, some directly relevant to the justice programs, others absolutely not. Um, horizontal principle should be applied where feasible and appropriate, taking into account sector specific rules as laid down in the financial regulation. Everything else is over. Bureaucratisation. I stress that any additional legislation will only lead to more administrative burden. Lastly, we deplore the lack of impact indicators in the current proposal that this is nearly in every programme like this. I am worried that measuring outputs and results sometimes just outputs will complicate subsequent evaluations. Also, it hinders the ability to adopt corrective measures during implementation because we cannot measure performance properly. The conclusion is. Finally, I would like to thank Hugo and Angelica from the Secretariat for their excellent work as well. Our. All the advisors and colleagues explicitly here for EPP and all shadow rapporteurs already being in contact with me and the rapporteur from the dedicated committee. So thanks a lot for this good cooperation. I'm looking forward to your amendments. The deadline is Monday on the 11th May at 5 p.m..”
  Accounting and auditing of EU budget
• “Freedom. And not under Putin's regime. I'd love to be in a democracy where citizens can decide. And at the end, I'd love to be in to have the possibility to do my own choices and not to be forced by a regime. This is, for me, all cost related, that we are paying for whatever, because I think this is the most important. And I see that Poland has developed excellently. Congratulations to the Polish population because they did a great job with the European money.”
  EU-Russia relations (from March 2022)
• “Good luck and stay firm. Thank you. It's meeting. So I think we can be quick. And it's a just a the last points, the point number 15 of our agenda. Mobilization of the European Globalisation Adjustment Fund for displaced workers following an application from Sweden. That's Northvolt. This was this example that I gave before, where the colleague Andreas was looking a little bit because they didn't receive only 600 million. As I said, they received 900 million subsidies. And even so, they are insolvent. So we are facing several problems for the workers. And my colleague, Mr. Salla, has asked me to say something on her behalf. She says, dear chair, dear colleagues, I am pleased to present my report on the mobilisation of the European Globalisation Adjustment Fund for Displaced Workers concerning Northvolt in Sweden. The proposal provides 8.5 million in support to help. Around 5800 dismissed workers returned to work through training, guidance and entrepreneurship measures. My report ensures a balanced and efficient use of EU funds. I try to underline, for example, Europe's need for a strong battery industry to reduce dependencies as well as to achieve its climate and energy transition targets. The need for a faster and simpler EGF process, while fully safeguarding the rights of the European Parliament as budgetary authority. Transparency and evaluation of funds. Clear visibility of EU funding to highlight its added value. I am therefore looking forward to your amendments and hope for a broad majority and swift adoption. So this was the. The wording of our rapporteur, Aura Salah, uh, the shadow rapporteurs. So uh, I would like to take the floor. Yes. So Adnan from Saudi.”
  European Globalisation Adjustment Fund
• “I myself am shadow rapporteur and perhaps I could clear up a few points for you, Mr. Geisel. These funds have already been channelled to help the workers and funds are triggered once more funding is required. So the federal agency in Germany has already provided some support. Now the Goodyear workers have already benefited from local support. They're not waiting from disbursed on a disbursement from Brussels. This is to offer additional support when a major disaster occurs or a major company shuts down. This is often an urgent matter. And if we look at good year, we know that there is a company strategy in place and that we in the EPP have a very clear approach.”
  European Globalisation Adjustment Fund
• “So I don't see, but I would have a question to the commission about their replies. The commission says that they. There would be no legal basis on which it could further assess Member states preparedness or data quality before the introduction of the own resource. For me, that's just a joke because we have the finance regulation and we have revenues. And revenues must be correctly, uh, correctly dealt and correctly analysed. So, um, if you would have no possibility to analyse any kind of revenues that you receive and the data quality of the revenues, then our revenues would be just a joke because everybody could then, uh, manipulate the revenues as the member state would wish it, because we would have no possibility to check. So I don't think that this answer is a very qualified answer. So I would ask the commission to, um, Prepare itself a little bit better on the issue of data quality, because if we have a kind of own resources, then there must be reliable data quality. This is what we rely on in this budget. And this is something about the fairness between member states and explicitly in this area. I have a totally different opinion than the colleague Sanchez. Plastics is no joke.”
  Own EU resources
• “As regards support to workers affected by imminent job displacement in enterprises undergoing or. Affected by imminent job displacement in enterprises undergoing restructuring. Um. As Johan van Overtveldt would have been replacing Bogdan Voronca, I'm now replacing Johan van Overtveldt because he's not, um, able to be with us today. So he sends us his speaking points. Dear colleagues. The Commission has put forward a proposal to amend the regulation on the European Globalisation Adjustment Fund for displaced workers, EGF. This proposal has two major elements. On the one hand, it aims to enable the EGF to not only support already displaced workers, but also workers affected by imminent job displacement. Besides broadening the scope of the EGF for a potentially wider range of beneficiaries, the proposal replaces the current case by case mobilisation with a single annual mobilisation, significantly changing the current procedures. This aspect is of particular concern to our committee, as it effectively ends the regular involvement of the budgetary authority and therefore severely undermines its oversight role. The draft budgetary assessment I am presenting today on behalf of the rapporteur, Mr. Van Overveld highlights the challenges the proposal presents to the prerogatives of the budgetary authority. We will face this situation in other, um, legislative proposals either. So the Parliament has really to play its role. When the Commission presented its proposal in this committee a couple of weeks ago, we did not hear any convincing arguments to justify this drastic change.”
  European Globalisation Adjustment Fund
• “So following the protocol order that foresees that afet with a is before but with B. So I come now to be Siegfried. You have the floor. **Siegfried Mureșan: Thank you. Thank you very much, Madam President. Thanks to both presidents. And let me start by thanking both committees, the A committee and the B committee. So afet and budgets for organising this joint meeting today and for agreeing to work swiftly but thoroughly on this facility. This facility is important, and it has even become more urgent in recent weeks. It is important because the Republic of Moldova is an EU candidate country. It is a neighboring country to the European Union. Its stability and security are a reference to the stability of the European Union as a whole, and to the stability of Ukraine. Given that the Republic of Moldova is located westwards of Ukraine, it has become more urgent, as we did see before the presidential, before the presidential elections and the referendum on European integration that took place in the Republic of Moldova at the end of October and beginning of November, we saw that the Russian Federation is trying to significantly interfere in the Republic of Moldova, trying to disrupt democratic electoral processes, trying to affect the European integration course of the country. And we also know that, particularly in winter months, the Russian Federation, through its gas suppliers, attempts to use this as an instrument to to blackmail countries. The Republic of Moldova used to be 100% dependent on Russian gas three years ago. It is much less dependent right now, but still it is purchasing some gas from the Russian Federation and it might be under severe pressure. Threats to increase price as of the 1st of January. So this is why we, as a European Union have to contribute to strengthening the resilience of this country. And we believe that this growth plan is the right tool because it is modeled on the European Recovery and Resilience Facility philosophy of both investments and reforms, but it also draws from some of the lessons and some elements are better and improved here because we had the Recovery Resilience Facility.”
  EU-Moldova relations
• “Thank you very much. My question go in nearly the same direction as Olivier Chastel. That's clear, because, um, I see that, uh, the rented space is increasing, but the staff is not increasing in the same size. Um, then we have a triple from around this 203,000 to 656,000. And even the answers did not give a real impression because is always tries again to explain this. Oh, we cannot explain security. Yes, you can explain security. That's quite easy to explain security, because you don't need to give us the whole rescue plans or whatever. This is not what we expect, but we expect to know what are the real costs. And as I see it, the security costs are not causing the increase. So there are several other issues like instead of two meeting rooms, we have five meeting rooms. And so I would expect a little better explanation from the side of the ease as the one we received, because tripling the cost. And if you add the further cost, as Olivier Chastel was mentioning, then we are over 700,000 in a year. So that's a huge increase from the former coming from the former building. So I would expect from ease a little bit more explanation about this.”
  Discharge of EU institutions and agencies
• “Um, then the next thing that I would like to express, um, when I talked to our new as a chief of the secretariat here first. Welcome here. And. But, Elisa, as you are sitting there, congratulations. But not only congratulations, I think that the Budget Committee. Um, thanks you a lot for the eight years. Um, in, uh, in this committee, um, and we I don't know about meeting without you sitting beside the chair, I can't remember. So thanks a lot. And congratulations to your new position. Um, we are fully confident and trust you that you will be a very, a very good, uh, advocate for us, either as budget committee and for all things that are relating, um, related to. Indeed, Elisa di Fara has been the head of the Budget Committee secretariat since 2017. She was appointed director before summer, now overseeing the work of both the budget committees. She has been in the Budget Committee secretariat since 2010. I was there since 2009. So my I remember well as administrator and then head of unit, with only a short interruption when she led the secretariat of the EMIs Inquiry Committee. So yes, that means almost 15 annual budgets.”
  Discharge of EU institutions and agencies
• “Dear colleagues. So, um, as you know, the justice program is one of the important programs to preserve our European values and to defend the rule of law and certain justice standards. Um, the justice program is a key instrument for fostering the rule of law, judicial cooperation, and access to justice in order to uphold the values enshrined in the treaties. It is vital to support and connect our judiciary staff and advance with full respect to Member states competences, a coherent and functioning judiciary within the European Union. The Commission proposes 798 million. We consider this insufficient and propose an increase of 92 million to a total of 890 million as adopted in the MMF interim report. Unfortunately, the proposal foresees only one single operational operational budget line. I think this is our general problem in several areas. Despite three distinct specific objectives, the lack of a detailed indicative budgetary nomenclature hampers parliamentary steering and oversight. This overly aggregated structure gives the Commission excessive discretion over spending priorities, which bypasses the budgetary authority of the Parliament. We call for the establishment of indicative sub envelopes per specific objective in the basic act, so that each objective must be reflected in a dedicated budget line. A mere steering mechanism is no substitute for the treaty based prerogatives of the budgetary authority.”
  EU Supervision of the Rule of Law
• “And then have a question on travel. On travel, I'd like to expressly give you a compliment for the travel office. We did complain earlier on a few years ago, and the travel office has become clearly better in the way that it works, and that's something I wanted to say expressly as a compliment. Things are much more automated. It's much less complicated. We have a 24 hour service. If they stayed a little longer than Friday lunchtime and stayed even to Friday afternoon, I think that would help many members because members don't stop work on Friday lunchtime. Something else is looking at the huge number of individual issues are presented and answered in differing manners to members and staff. How can we push for more simplification? And above all, try and make sure that there's a harmonised feedback or answer to staff two members of this House. And when it comes to the tone that's being used, I'm framing my words carefully. The tone that's used needs to be appropriate as well. Finally, the administration wants legal certainty. I can tell you that members and officials and staff also want that same legal certainty. So what you consider legal certainty to be achieved by heavy handed red tape that doesn't actually provide that legal certainty to members, certainly not an adequate level of legal certainty. And I don't know, 70 or 80 colleagues came to me and said, you know, we really don't know what we're meant to do. We get different instructions from different quarters. And earlier, I've covered the issue of how long files need to be kept new. New Uh, staff didn't know that they could be checked and that they have to have proof.”
  Accounting and auditing of EU budget
• “Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for the information. In the name of Monica. I would like also ask the question concerning and come back to the criterias because this is a very big portfolio. 300 buildings of course, understand in very different conditions. But once again I would like to ask what specific criteria of threshold does the ease use to determine whether to invest in renovation versus relocating or selling a delegation property, especially in high cost or high risk regions? And the second one, to what extent has the implementation of the co-location policy improve operational operational coordination and visibility of the EU abroad beyond financial reimbursement? Are the qualitative. Qualitative. Qualitative. Yes. Qualitative. Sorry. Or strategic performance indicators being tracked. Thank you.”
  Accounting and auditing of EU budget
• “Thank you very much, dear chair. So first I would like to say that the EU transparency Register is an important tool, but there are some loopholes that we have to that we have to solve. I'm very thankful to the team of Mr. Petrovic and our ECA member himself for the very valuable report. Um, even if the data stem from 2022, I think a lot of the recommendations are still valid and, um, only partially solved. Um, I have explicitly, um, I'm explicitly think that the quality of data should be reinforced further, because when I looked into the transparency register, I didn't have the impression that all the data were so of such a high quality that I would wish to have when I'm looking into it. Um, um, to improve the user friendliness is always something that is very important in the internet, because people need to be able to read it and to use it. But I have several questions on, on on issues and but on one requirement or one recommendation of Mr. Petrovich, I would say this is not very realistic. Why you you are asking that all non-scheduled meetings with lobbyists should be introduced into the transparency register. I will go afterwards to a reception. I even don't know to whom I'm speaking, because there are people coming to me telling me, oh, I, Mr. Mueller, I don't know to whom he belongs or she and I don't have the time to ask them all if they are lobbyists or not.”
  Transparency requirements for interest groups
• “Okay. Dear colleagues. Please sit down. We have voting time. Huh? Yeah. Dear colleagues of the Greens. Damien. Thank you very much. So let's start adoption of the agenda. Are there any objections? And if not, the agenda is deemed adopted. Then we have interpretation in 16 languages. So the speakers are invited to speak in their own mother language when available. Then adoption of the minutes. Are there any objections? I don't see any. So the minutes of the sixth and the 7th of November are deemed adopted. Now we are going to point for our voting time. But first we have to start with the explanations in the budget of the other sections first. I would invite the European Parliament to take the floor. I tried to find there is the list from EPP for C 11 2024. Miss Margarita Abecassis, director for Infrastructure and Equipment at DG Itech.”
  Multilingualism in EU institutions
• “Just a brief question, and it has to do with the fact that the funds for the space sector have been cut. The justification for this is a bit cryptic. It could be more efficient and so on. I don't really perceive that justification. I'd like to know how this is going to be offset. How you really justify this in the space sector. I think our needs are great and space has a major impact on competitiveness. And I'm also thinking simply of some of the strategic defense questions in this connection. I'd like to know how. Then the space sector will be affected by more scarce resources. Thank you.”
  EU competences on space policy
• “Perfect. One minute. Wow. Q Number three. Mr. Lorenzo Fidel, head of unit for financial assistance, budget and verification on the CTU. Thank you. Chair.”
  Accounting and auditing of EU budget
• “The programs as there is a need for predictability and the possibility really to to to plan the things and if this predictability is not given we see it already in horizon if this happens with eleven percent of grants that are then then the the credibility is lost this is why it is a very important point now Isabel Benjaminia is the last question round.”
  Conditions to access EU budget
• “Thank you very much, dear Cristoforo. I think it's a very interesting report, and it gives us a very detailed overview of what is working and not working. And as we see, a lot of things are not working. So this is a little bit frustrating in this area explicitly as plastics play a really big role in the pollution of the environment. So, um, perhaps, uh, the own resources on, on these plastics could help us to bring the member states. To act, um, at least after six years of the entry into, uh, the entry and of the validity of the of of of our legislation. So now, uh, I would like to give the floor to Mr. Martin Schwab, the deputy head of unit responsible for revenue inspections, control and enforcement from DG budge to hear the Commission's comments and assessments concerning the report. You have five minutes.”
  Own resources (plastics)
• “Thank you. Chair. Um, my. First question pertains to the steering board. It's nice to want this. Or if we're going to get the steering board for the national plans. But what happens to the subsidiarity principle? For what regions should the regions have a steering board made up of the Parliament and all sorts in order for this down, top down management of these cohesion programmes? I have to be frank about this. I see subsidiarity working very differently, the regions negotiating directly with the Commission as they have done hitherto. Second point competitiveness fund. Will there be calls also. So people have to or companies will be applying. For research funding for example. Or is there going to be an allocation, as with Northvolt, uh, which came from the Solidarity Fund, because there were 600 million of subsidies that were paid out. Unfortunately, they went bust because politicians didn't know where the best ideas were to be found, but simply that, uh, so the ideas need to grow up from the bottom rather than be imposed from the top down. Final point on the agencies. 60% of what is done by the agencies is outside of your mandate. When will the commission change that? The DGS in the commission are putting jobs in the agencies which are outside of their mandate. Now we can complain that they've got too little staff on the one hand, but the DGS are located outside of the commission's mandate, so I think we need to respect that.”
  EU cohesion/structural-fund architecture: consolidation vs ring-fenced separate funds
• “And then you have to restart the whole procedure. So but you have the program that you have. So I think we have to think about a mechanism that is clear and transparent about tender procedures. In this it related areas where, um, we ask the commission, the, the agencies to have a better cyber security because there was one case where really data data were stolen and cyber security is identified as identified as a growing systemic risk. Cepol was facing a cyber attack in June 2024. Disrupted had to disrupt all training activities. Um, the agencies rely at the moment very heavily on external contractors, on ICT resourcing, um. These dependencies create a huge operational vulnerabilities and risks to continuity and institutional knowledge in a whole. Key demands were again ex-ante exposed controls to ensure contracts are only launched with proper financing decisions, improved documentation, transparency and evaluation procedures then immediately address procurement irregularities. And there again the question to find solutions for these IT questions that are not normal, uh, normal tenders. Um, in comparison if you are in construction. Um, so budgetary discipline and in the area of governance ethics and in the area of cyber security, I have um, expressed further recommendations. Um, who wants to read everything? The report is public.”
  Cybersecurity investments for critical infrastructure
• “So thank you very much for this starting point. Now I would like to give the floor first to Siegfried Muresan and then to Carla Tavares, as our two co-rapporteurs. **Siegfried Mureșan (Romania, EPP): Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Good morning, dear colleagues. Thank you very much, really, for the time that you have put into this useful piece of work. Of course, today here is not a day for decisions in our committees, a day to listen to your reflections, to add some of our thoughts. We're very happy that the Budget Committee has opened its doors to you and this study because we think the budget has to be elaborated in an inclusive manner. Ideas of think tanks, of NGOs, of course expectations of beneficiaries have to be included, while trying to design and implement the budget. Of course, in an untransparent way won't work, will not lead us to an agreement, and will also not lead us to a successful implementation. I think you were rather accurate in the first part when you were describing the proposal of the Commission, facts and also the shortcomings. Some of the shortcomings I think you addressed, but for some I might still have some questions. Of course, everyone knows where the Parliament stands in defending European policies, in wanting to make sure that what was achieved through treaties, you know, in terms of functioning of the European Union fifty years ago, in terms of budget competencies for the Parliament as a budget authority, is not weakened. Of course, we understand there needs to be a balance between new and old priorities. Basically, in that sense, my questions: You were also talking about the win nationalization, the idea with the plans.”
  Conditions to access EU budget
• “So are there. I have some doubts on our transparency register. Secondly, the European Environmental Bureau and the Health and Environmental Alliance are receiving millions of funds and are even not listed in the register. So I asked the commission, how can this happen, that they are receiving millions of funds and they are even not registered in the register that Europe. So the Commission should should know what they are doing internally. Then secondly, EPA found some issues with data quality, including. Duplicate entries. Incomplete. Entries. Incomplete financial data. Missing mandatory data. What kind of measures will the Commission and the whole Bureau take to oblige the organisations to complete and renew yearly their declarations, as foreseen in the framework? Question three and I don't expect all the answers today. To be frank, I would give the questions to the Secretariat. Perhaps I could receive some written answers on it to, to, to to make the things easier. Partially. Then according to the Secretariat, in cases of de-registration of NGOs from the Transparency Register, information on the NGO is then removed together with the registration number which results in less transparency. No historical data are available if a reregistration is done and even if the persons are the same ones, but only appearing under other names. So what efforts have been made to retain information about NGOs removed from the register, and the reasons for the deregistration.”
  Transparency requirements for interest groups
• “Thanks a lot to the Commission. Uh, the deadline for amendments is the 10th of November at 12:00, and amendments are to be tabled, please, in English. Uh, yes. Sometimes colleagues forget it. But, uh, for the timeline, we need it in English. Um, the vote will take place at the meeting of the 20th of November, then 16. Conclusion. On behalf of the Union of the protocol on the implementation to the of the Fisheries Partnership Agreement between the Democratic Republic of Sao Tomé and Principe and the European Community. Um, Bogdan, you are our rapporteur. Would you like to take the floor? Yes.”
  Fisheries access for developing countries
• “Thank you very much. Well, I have questions to both of you, actually. On the one hand, it's good that there are new rules that have been implemented which are pushing the implementation of transparency and trying to deal with a number of issues to DG Perez, first DG presidency and to Mr. Coletti, the question of red tape bureaucracy. I get the impression that both staff and members are faced with extreme levels of bureaucratic burden. We still have this problem that many documents have to be provided in duplicate and triplicate every five years. Even if you haven't changed where you live, you have to reconfirm and I still have to confirm my birthday and how many children I have. Now, I don't think members or assistants try to make up the fact that they have or don't have children. Nicholas is nodding. Maybe he does invent these sort of things, I don't know, but I just wanted to put it out there. You know, the principle of proportionality, as is set out in the financial regulation should be applied. I get the impression that it is not being applied sufficiently, neither when it comes to the implementation of the 14 point plan, nor on the implementation of the new measures concerning travelling, etc.. My question to DG presidency would be how can we take into account the fact that we are faced with more and more bureaucracy? How can we reduce that? On the transparency register, for example, people are just writing down everything that's not nailed down. Otherwise they're worried that they'll be suspected of something. We need to have more clarity there. And the same would apply to the conflict of interests, that whole topic in the committees. There is a very different ways of dealing with this and different ways of interpreting what needs to be done.”
  Accounting and auditing of EU budget
• “So now we continue first with agenda point three: Chair's announcements. The coordinator's decisions of the fourth of September can be found in the meetings files. They are deemed adopted if no objections are raised.”
  Discharge of EU institutions and agencies
• “So thanks a lot. Our two co-rapporteurs. I think we need enough time for the parliamentary procedure. We will do it as fast as possible, but you have a parliament and you should recognize it and then you have to be quicker. Not always. We have to be quicker, to be frank. So perhaps this time, Siegfried first, and then the colleague makes a Siegfried. **Siegfried Mureșan: Thank you very much. Let me start exactly where where the president has now concluded in good faith. Here the two committees, Outfit and Budgets Committee, have put forward a calendar which is fast, which is tight, which expresses our commitment to adopt the facility fast. But and as also members have said, Kai has said it, um, the democratic responsibilities of Parliament have to be fulfilled. We understand this might not be the major concern of the commission, but it is a major concern and the responsibility of colleagues here in the in the Parliament. Um, we have also, together with colleagues from the opinion giving committees, Conte and Inter, scheduled extraordinary meetings by those committees in January so that we can move faster. And what we have now on the table in terms of calendar is the fast that is the fastest that Parliament can do. Let me thank the shadows for their constructive approach. Um, each of them. The points made by Victor Biden, by Cai on simplification, on cross-border projects, on transparency, including transparency of final beneficiaries, on the role of the Parliament, the scrutiny, the dialogue. All these points are legitimate and some are already included in the report. We are happy to work with the shadows in the amendments phase to continue to including those those points. We also, of course, rely on on on Dunbar to work together also with with Anouk, the shadow in the budgets committee along the lines of the Parliament's position on the Pre-financing and the loans and grants balance. Now to these two points specifically, um, we we are proposing so indeed for the Western Balkans facility and for the Ukraine facility, there was a 33% grants component. For Moldova. It's less. We understand why because there is no fresh money. **Siegfried Mureșan: But, um, um, mobilizing the cushion for the guarantee is firstly possible. It is justified in emergency situations. The Russian interference in the Republic of Moldova, which we've seen, by the way, after the presentation of the facility by the Commission, is a new development. It makes the situation in the country more acute. The situation on the energy market is becoming more acute to the country as well. So there is an emerging challenge there. As I said, the interference of the Russian Federation is emerging as we are speaking. It appeared and it amplified over the course of the last two months. Let me also add that the cushion, the cushion was reinforced in the MFF revision, and it was also reinforced in the early budget negotiations. And we can also assess whether the yearly budgets, procedure reinforcement of cushion might be needed. So there are resources available there. This is why we propose the mobilisation there. Um, when it comes to the pre-financing, as we said, our proposal is the 20%. We are looking forward to working with the Co-legislator with the support from the Commission, with its role as an honest broker, to, um, to facilitate a good outcome. I also thank Mr. Brown, Mr. Sanchez, for their remarks to Mr. Brown for caring particularly about the people of Moldova, not wanting to overburden them. But of course, I will need more time to study their interventions to be able to provide an answer to their to their remarks. So that's it from from our side. And as we said, we are looking forward to working with colleagues during the amendments phase. And the vote at the level of the two committees is rescheduled end of January. Deadline for amendments 18th December. Thank you.”
  EU-Ukraine relations
• “So thank you very much. Now we are at Catch the Eye, and I would like to have some questions to you from. The first question is related to Slovakia. As you know, the Commission has started the first step of the conditionality mechanism for Slovakia because of severe corruption cases, investigations and police actions in the last weeks. And we had a hearing here in parliament, um, in which, uh, relevant stakeholders were announcing that there are further cases that would be presented to Apple and to the Commission. Um, I would like to have the questions, uh, about the two positive assessments for the payments. So how do you see the relation or the link to the conditionality mechanism? At the same time, positive assessment of payments, uh, during the time of severe investigations where a lot of authorities of the state are involved. Second question would be about the project as the projects will be realized, uh, partly later. What? The Commissioner Dombrovskis already answered once these questions, that all the money that has been paid by the European Commission to the member States has to be spent for the project. So if the projects but are at the end are not realised or could not be realised, but the milestones and targets are fulfilled. So, um, what will be the reaction of the commission? So are you asking then the money back if the projects have not been realised till the time delay has expired or what will you do? Commissioner Dombrovskis at this time said, we will ask the money back. But now we have further. We have further steps in a direction of more fulfilment. So I would be interested how you see this situation.”
  EU Supervision of the Rule of Law
• “Sorry, I really would propose that you give written replies on the lot of questions that were raised today. This is not a thing where bilaterally you talk to one or to the other, please do it in a written way. This is a clear wish of three committees.”
  Transparency requirements of EU institutions
• “Well, this time I've written the entire report. First of all, thank you to Susanna and the entire team of Secretariat for the excellent cooperation. I've said that the advisers from the PPE Group have said that the other advisers have helped a lot, so that we can try to push forward. Common concerns was and his team was involved with this. So thank you for this cooperation when it comes to self financing. I'd like to say that the network itself is thinking about how many extra tasks are being entrusted to the agency, which is not really their core work, and how many things that they are unable to do because they don't have sufficient staff. We need to answer both questions. If we don't have enough staff anyway, then the member states need to staff and finance any extra wishes they might have otherwise that can. Otherwise, it simply can't be done because you can't expect the agency to do extra work. As for men and women with farms wanting, SMEs said something else. Obviously we need to staff according to competence, but to be honest, there are a lot of competent women out there as well. And if you've got 90% men in an agency That's not necessarily a great thing, and it would be good if we thought in terms of geographical allocation in the EU as well, so that we have better understanding between the member states and agencies, which have a very, um, one sided staffing, often have difficulties. All men or all women is not a good idea. We shouldn't be looking at this in ideological terms, but we should have some commitment to this. And when it comes to tenders and the carryovers, perhaps we could think in terms of having a joint legal service for the agencies, because the agencies are constantly in a bit of a legal vacuum and they don't have a lot of support. So those two points I'd like to put, I would like to focus on more so that we have better legal certainty for the agencies than what they have at the moment.”
  Discharge of EU institutions and agencies
• “For our members. Dear Commission, to be frank, I never had such a meeting before and I'm now here since six, no, 17 years. So this is quite a tough challenge I would say. And we have to go very, very deeply into the details. So I would propose, as the interpreters will give us further 15 minutes so that first the eckhard takes the floor, then the commission. And I would ask you, the commission, that there were a lot of questions. And I don't want that all the colleagues don't receive answers. But some questions were doubled, some were, but there were still a lot of questions that perhaps in a written way, to give a really constructive answers, because this would ameliorate the possibility to work on it for the for the committee members. And at the same time perhaps you have more time to reflect on the criticisms that were quite tough today. Perhaps this gives a structure to work on it. Now, I would like to ask first a car to take the floor. And who is the first one? Anime. So we come from left to right.”
  Multilingualism in EU institutions
• “So I have no flowers for Guillaume, but a lot of work. So congratulations to the new head of the Secretariat. And we have a lot of new colleagues having arrived at the Budget Committee.”
  Discharge of EU institutions and agencies
• “Seven. And then no building policy. And then we come to the votes. Everybody prepared for the votes. So that's fine. Then first we start with number nine. That's 2025 budget, section three. Um, I open. Everybody understands. I open the vote. I close. No. 27. Somebody is missing. 28. Perfect. I close the vote. It's 22 plus, four minus and two abstentions. Then we are coming to, uh, 2025 budget. Other sections under point ten. That's the Committee of the regions transfer. Um, I open the vote. It's a roll call. Vote? One is still missing. 28. That's fine. Close the vote. 23 plus. One minus and four abstentions. So thank you very much, dear colleagues, because in building policy there are no votes. Now we wait one minute. Let's wait one minute till everybody has arranged. So, dear colleagues. No. No problem. So, dear colleagues, let's start with the mobilisation of the European globalisation adjustment point. That's our agenda. Point number 12. Um, it's for displaced workers following an application from Belgium EGF. So we our rapporteurs Mr. Picardo and as he needs to be quick, I give you the floor at once.”
  Youth employment & training
• “So, dear colleagues, sorry we were stuck in the elevator. So funny things in the morning. So I'm very happy and delighted to see you. Welcome back for the first meeting of the Budget Committee after the summer recess. Um, and, um, as most of you may know, uh, our Johan van Overtveldt had a serious bicycle accident. I, um, he will not be able to attend us for, uh, um, few weeks. Um, I had a telephone call with him. He sends us his best regards. Uh, the surgery went well, and he can be lucky that not more has happened. So, uh, we hope and we wish. And send him the best wishes for recreation and whoever likes, we would like to send him a card with our best wishes and with a nice gift, because he loves the praline and everything that is sweet and so. And he was praising his wife that she was so helpful to him. Now, since listen, that's the best that you can say to your wife and give her, uh, this, uh, very nice greetings of you. So thank you very much for the understanding and best regards of him. I hope that he's soon back. And, um, as we know, he's a fighter, so he knows how to how how to come back and to, uh, be with us.”
  Budget for EU politicians
• “Short, very brief conclusion. First, very clearly this programme is not supporting any kind of justice court in Member states, whichever they are paid by France, by Spain, by Germany, by which member state ever and is not paid by the European Union. This is just disinformation, to be frank. Secondly, this programme is financing the cooperation between member states, against organised crime, against brutal murders, against terrorists and a lot of other things, cross-border issues. So I would think that we try to go to the facts and not to some kind of rumours or political ideologies. This would be helpful in the MFF, and then we can have different opinions about certain smaller issues in these programs, but not about the real cooperation inside of the European Union in very necessary areas, because cross-border crime is not stopping at the French border and not at the German border. It's going cross-border. This is why I think we should talk about the different lines, and to have really indicative budgets for every part of this justice programme, I think a big majority is supporting this approach and to have really the possibility to trace back and not only to have the kind of indicators the Commission foresees, but more really, to have the impact of the programme that we can discuss this to have a good programme at the end with a real European added value. So thanks a lot, dear colleagues. I'm looking forward to discussing. Thank you, Thank you.”
  EU law enforcement cooperation in criminal matters
• “Thank you very much. Just briefly, I have two questions. Gender budgeting. That was really two areas. On the one hand. When people external people, when they're asking about statistics, we can't just expect a huge amount of data. That can be a really serious problem, because I know this from various contributors, that if you have to explain for every single group how old, male, female, and sometimes you have to indicate sexual orientation. And because we don't want to demand a statistic that would have to out somebody, that doesn't seem fair. But these statistics tackle questions play a role that because they're not coordinated necessarily so. And so in other words, you almost get a counter-reaction because of that. What else do we have to provide in terms of statistics? Et cetera. On the other hand, there's a necessity. And here I agree with John Mark and with Isabelle. We have to find out where are there really good projects which really would help us get this overview and see what is the status of equality. So we have to sort of how to maneuver between these two extremes. And that's where the gender budgeting has to be. And so I wanted to ask how can we find this balance. Because we don't want we want to quality statistics, not just any statistics. We want to have a system that's efficient, that has an impact, that actually causes an improvement with gender equality. And how are we going to get that data? All right. Very much. I will just go through here in order. Mrs. Logan, if you would like to start.”
  Gender roles, equality and inclusion
• “Thank you. Chairman. I am looking at the draft presented Today, there is an attempt made to skew the balance of power between the institutions towards the Commission. What do we mean by ring fencing? Well, a chunk of a budget or fund can be shifted to a different envelope without input from Parliament. We have legislation covering these policies, but we will not have a reliable basis and predictability for financing. What this means is that reforms will be required, but we won't have commensurate financing, and we won't have transparency between commission and Parliament. Now we will take a very close look at all proposals. National plans mean a top down approach. In the past, governments set their own Priorities. When it came to the different priorities, they adopted their own legislation. Decisions taken in regional parliaments. Now government officials will work with commission officials, come up with national plans. Perhaps the Parliament might express wishes and be consulted. But really, I think we are going to have to go through this with a fine tooth comb. I'm not terribly enthusiastic.”
  EU political integration
• “So, dear colleagues. Let's try to start step by step on this Monday evening, the 9th of February, and we start with the adoption of the agenda. This is the easiest point, I think. If no objection is raised, the agenda is deemed adopted. Then second point is announcement interpretation. This evening interpretation is provided in a lot of languages. So I hope that as many colleagues are here as we have interpreters in languages, then adoption of minutes. Um, if no objection is raised, the minutes of the meetings of the 5th of November, 2025 and 24th of November 2025 are deemed adopted. Any. Body who would like to raise the hand? No. Then point four. Now recovery and resilience. Dialogue with welcome, dear Vice President of the Commission, Raffaele Fitto, for the next, let's say, dialogue that we have. We now move to this recovery and resilience dialogue with the Commission, organized in line with article 26 of regulation 2021 241, establishing the Recovery and Resilience Facility. I would like to welcome Executive Vice President Fitto. Um, and a little bit later, Commissioner Dombrovskis, to this 22nd recovery and resilience dialogue since the start of RF implementation in 2021, the sixth one on this parliamentary term. Commissioner Dombrovskis will join us as soon as plenary debate on the ECB Annual Report 2025 ends.”
  Multilingualism in EU institutions
• “So I was interested in what is happening there and why is there a problem? Um, it is that the the director of the, of the agency did not treat it in an adequate way. Um, the, um, temporary, um, contract of, uh, one legal adviser. Um, there seemed to be a very tough, controversial debate between, um, the director and, um, the legal adviser was treated in a way that I would say was not only unfriendly, but nearly by, uh, harassment. This was the reason why the General Court annulled the whole decision of not renewing her temporary contract, uh, and ordered to pay €30,000 for material damage and 10,000 for non-material damage. The lawsuit is still ongoing. I have to say that when I read the whole case without mentioning everything, I have to say that commission has to find a way how these type of disputes can be treated in a better way. And secondly, I just know the German words, this is why I changed the German. Um, the commission.”
  Discharge of EU institutions and agencies
• “Thank you very much. I'll be speaking my mother tongue this afternoon. So thank you very much for the excellent cooperation with him and his team. And I'd also like to thank the Secretariat as well. Claudia, Benoit and Francesco, thank you all very much for the excellent cooperation. On the conditionality. Regulation, conditionality is for us as the EPP um, and in as part of our cooperation, I think it's important we say that it's good that we've introduced this regulation, and it's good to see how, because of the amount of resistance there was to this regulation and it has shown its positive effects. But as you'll see in the report, we have to try and improve the implementation of the regulation. And one important part of this is an important part, in my view, is that we look at the different legal instruments for handing down penalties and for. Withdrawing funds, and they have to be improved. And there are two different legal interpretations in the Commission saying that this should be the absolute last resort instrument, um, and that when. A breach is so bad and you have to react in a way that is preventative. To prevent other breaches happening, then this comes in. The other thing is that the guidelines are being need to be revised. Proportionality and an assessment of proportionality is very important here. Everything has to be transparent. And this has to be done openly so that it is understandable, which isn't always possible for us as members of Parliament at the moment. Breaches and infringements. Have to be viewed and connected to the risk to the budget. There are groups or companies that Ah, that could be that could see their funds withdrawn because they don't mirror the their own government's attitudes. So. So for this reason, I think that the discussion needs to be continued on these points.”
  Conditions to access EU budget
• “So thank you very much for this very interesting presentation. And now our final expert is Miss Petra Kelly, who works in the Austrian Parliament Budget office. Office. Austria is a reference when it comes to gender budgeting, and the country has enshrined it as a budgetary principle in its constitution. You have the floor for 15 minutes.”
  Gender roles, equality and inclusion
• “So that at the end the prices are higher again. I see this not only in Parliament. I see this in commission. So what can you how can you contribute to make it less complex, to make it in a way so that there are more offers given and not in this complexity as it is happening at the moment? And secondly, would you make proposals for the administration? I follow the colleague Gerbrandy from former to reduce the overly complex rules and reduce bureaucracy. I have sometimes the impression that with every audit of ECA and we are adding something, adding more. Adding more. Adding more. Nobody is thinking about is this really a balanced approach and a proportionate approach in, uh, in terms of staff, in terms of financial means? And sometimes I can tell you that some members, if they are asking, were asked, um, have some problems. They, uh, they are just stopped to ask and say I pay it myself just because of stopping this bureaucracy. So this is um, then I would have the question, what could be done to close remaining actions related to changes of the reimbursement for visitor groups, an essential part of every member's work, explicitly, of Parliament's work. Last year we had only 4,074% implementation of the sponsored visitor groups. How can we improve this? And to Mr. Schnarre, um, you said that you cannot give an overview of European elections, but do you see any interference of third states or do you see any attacks? I would say by social media. Sometimes I prefer to see them. So this is why. So. Thank you. So thank you very much about this role of TikTok, the role of social media, the role of certain social media in in in the way how they are disinformation, using disinformation to mislead people against the European Union and against the European elections. Thank you very much. Sorry, but there are so many.”
  Accounting and auditing of EU budget
• “Mr. president, Commissioner, dear colleagues, first I would like to present the best regards, the greetings of Johann Johan van Pelt, who will join us again when he can be back in Strasbourg and in Brussels. But he is on a good way of recovering. Um, first I would like to thank the minister that he is coming personally because we are not always used to. The minister is doing like this. So thank you very much for your presence. Secondly, um, the council suffers under a situation that the council produced the MFF until 2027 is too small. The problem is that the challenges have changed a lot. First we had a corona and suddenly then we were facing a war. We were facing trade problems. We were facing a totally new geostrategic constellations. So this means that this MFF has to fulfil duties that were not foreseen in 2020. This gives to me one question that the Commission already has raised. The council is talking about competitiveness, about innovation, about boosting industry for more taxes, for more possibilities, for better, better competitiveness. And then we are cutting your cutting horizon. This is contradictory. The council is taking decisions in the area of security, border control, explicitly migration, stopping illegal migration or irregular migration.”
  Size of EU budget
• “So thanks a lot for this very interesting report, and I can imagine that it's not always easy in the member states to tackle this gender gap, even not in Austria. I know it from Germany, but I think every member state has its own different kind of problems. But sometimes they are even similar in the kind they are appearing. So thank you very much for this very interesting presentation. Now I would like to give the floor first to Lucia because she is our responsible for member for this. And then Nicola is Danuta. So we have really a 100% gender guaranteed representation.”
  Gender roles, equality and inclusion
• “Okay, so let's go. We start with number seven. European semester for economic policy coordination. Dear colleagues. May I ask you to listen? Dear Kirsten. Kirsten. Lüdecke. She's even not listening. Could we stop the talks of the European Parliament? It's interesting. They both are not listening. Brutal. So let's start the European Semester for economic. It's nice if the European Parliament civil servant stuff is not listening to the chair. So. The European Semester for Economic Policy Coordination 2025. So first on our agenda is the exchange of views on budget draft opinion on the European Semester, for which Mr. Van Overtveldt is the rapporteur. He will be replaced by Mr. Michel Picardo to present the draft opinion. There he is. Thanks a lot. You have the floor.”
  European Semester (social dimension)
• “So thanks a lot to the commission. Um, and we continue now only in English. I hope that the colleagues agree with it because interpretation will end now. At this moment I would ask our experts, but you spoke already English, so that's not very innovative of me, but there will be no translation anymore. So thank you very much. You have the floor. Just one short remark. Free trade agreements, dear Giulia. Always, always. Decreased inflation and increased working places. Protectionism was always the problem. So. But we have to be careful. And I think that the Commission always was quite careful with the free trade agreements that they did. You have the floor.”
  Free trade agreements (FTAs)
• “I just two short questions. We are always facing the situation that we have a kind of a lot of start ups. But then they are ending up to be bought by Google, by Chinese, by whomever. Mostly not by European companies, even mostly by companies stemming from outside of the European Union. What would you recommend us to get a better situation in making growing up startups or younger companies that are not so big but that have quite a lot of potential, but a low amount of money, a low amount of financial means Then secondly, what would you propose about the governance structure as Christian was saying? There is no clear governance structure and about simplification in this, because simplification means that you need a clear governance structure and you need clear rules how to do the things and not so many KPIs that at the end we don't know. As we had it in the RAF I never saw so many KPIs in my life than in this RAF. And they were not all unclear, but a lot of them were unclear and not very precisely defining what we expect as outcome. What would you recommend us for this new type of plans? I would be very interested as I'm an enemy of plans, I have to say, because in communism we had five year plans. Now we have seven year plans. So I'm really not very amused by this.”
  Overall simplification of regulation in the EU
• “We need to have clearer standards and procedures. In place in terms of how funds can be, um, retrieved where necessary, particularly um, for the RF when funds have not been spent appropriately and there needs to be some kind of reversal procedure as it's known things are at the moment. The way things stands are on are far from far from being good. And with these breaches, we can't have a situation when there are infringements and when corruption takes place, that there's no procedure in place to retrieve the funds. Because you have some kind of procedure in place at one point and then two years down the line, you don't. It doesn't apply anymore. We've discussed things at length with each other, um, with the single market instrument. And there are some people who are trying to systematically create advantages for themselves with the single market. And there are judgments from the Court of Justice on how the guidelines can be used and built on. We need to improve the implementation. We have to change the implementation of the conditionality mechanism. Administrative harassment, a term that Jean-Marc Germain has used. I think that that's a good term. If there's some kind of systematic disadvantage and that companies or NGOs are systematically disadvantaged, then we have to be able to act. And then on my last point on Parliament, the information for Parliament could be earlier, better and more precise, more detailed, where the last to get the information after the press. And I don't think that that's appropriate. So the information process and the transparency processes need to be improved, transparency for citizens would improve, and it would be good if citizens could find this information on a website so they can work out exactly what it is that we do.”
  Conditions to access EU budget
• “Yes. So thanks a lot. Dear colleagues, also from my side, I would like to extend a warm welcome to all of you and to the three members of the European Court of Auditors, and thank them for presenting the court's opinion on the National and Regional Partnership Fund. In addition, I welcome the representatives of the European Commission, Mrs. Christiana Cannonball, director and DG, Mr. Oliver Sitter, director and DG agri, and Frank Seeber, director of DG Regio, and Mrs. Ruth Pasaman, director, DG ample. From a budgetary perspective, the proposed fund merges long standing policy strands, introduces a single planning instrument per member state, and proposes new flexibilities, mostly to the Commission, that would significantly reshape how resources are allocated, managed and controlled. Therefore, the opinion of the court is indeed truly instrumental as it provides us with an independent and technical assessment of a proposal that represents a fundamental redesign of the next multiannual financial framework, helping us Identify potential risks, governance gaps and control challenges at this stage. While there is still room to improve the legislative proposal and explicitly an important role by the Parliament as co-legislator, hence we must ensure that simplification does not come at the expense of transparency and that flexibility does not weaken parliamentary scrutiny, and that performance orientation is backed by solid accountability and auditability. We look forward to hearing your assessment and recommendations. And with this, I pass the floor now to my co-chair and of the committee. Dear Dragos, you have the floor.”
  Accounting and auditing of EU budget
• “I see that there is a lot of fun, but even so, we have to continue our meeting. May I ask all advisors, commission members or staff of the EP to go back to the places so that we can continue? And I would like to welcome warmly to our ECA Special report 1624 on EU revenue based on Non-recycled plastic packaging waste. A challenging start hindered by data that is not sufficiently comparable or reliable. Viable. And now I warmly welcome of the Court of Auditors member, Lefteris Christoforou. Our well appreciated colleague who will present us the very pertinent special report. So members of the Envy Committee have also been invited to this presentation, as the topic is of interest to them in this special report. The Court of Auditors concluded that the Member States faced some challenges with data comparability and reliability. The court recommends that the Commission should apply lessons learned to improve data comparability and reliability, and mitigate the risk that Waste Century Cycles is not actually recycled. And with this Lefteris Christoforou. The floor is yours. You have ten minutes.”
  Own resources (plastics)
• “In the seas and in the and in the Mediterranean and so on. So it destroys a lot of nature. It destroys a lot of lives. So and it causes a lot of problems for for health reasons and for animals and so on. So recycling is a new kind of industry that we have, and we are very meanwhile we are successful with it, but we have to become more successful with it. And the plastic and plastics own resources is one tool to make recycling more attractive. On one side and to have less plastic waste. So I would ask the Commission if they could rethink on recommendation one B because I think this is the most important one to have reliable data and to have a member states that are implementing. I agree, fully agree with Lefteris Christoforou saying that six years after the entry into force, a lot of member States are not fulfilling this directive. This is a shame, I have to say. This is really a shame. Um, so what is the commission doing really to improve this situation? So now I think commission again has the word. Mr. Schwab, you have now the problem to solve everything in five minutes.”
  Own resources (plastics)
• “Thank you very much, chair. I would like to express the same opinion as the chair and rapporteur did. Um, I think it's important, um, that Oib is presenting earlier and is giving a better overview on the future Prospections and on the future plans. I think that the extensions are not a problem because there is no increase of of costs inside, sometimes one year or less. So it's the same cost as they would have had if they would have stayed in, in this, uh, buildings. But if they could have gone to another building, then, uh, these type of costs would not have been raised, but higher amounts for the new buildings would have been. So there is in the cost side, it's not the big problem. Um, from the real cost, um, consequences. Um, I think, um, that the plans of the commission and I think we should, we should be aware of this, that the commission is reducing the square meters largely for the future and that this is a huge challenge for the staff because, um, if, for example, and I always already see the colleague furore, You would ask from all the staff of the ministries in France that they have to deliver 50% of their surface for the future, and that nobody has the right on its own working place anymore, and that they are in future, um, so-called, uh, open spaces or spaces where everybody has not its own space.”
  Discharge of EU institutions and agencies
• “We in the EPP likewise have a clear approach on decisions such as phasing out the internal combustion engine. We want to have a pragmatic approach rather than ideological approach. The overall goal should be to get rid of CO2 emissions, reduce them, rather than targeting a specific type of technology. We are not the technological experts here. We're politicians. So we are trying to work via omnibus measures. We didn't have a majority in the past, but we will have plenty of work ahead to try and achieve the goals set. In any case, I am pleased for the Goodyear workers that they will receive this support. Most of them are aged over 54. Many of them don't have, uh, professional qualifications. Those qualifications that they do have are perhaps no longer suited to the digital age. The workers let go are in a very difficult situation and trying to survive in a very competitive world. And I think we're doing something good for them here today. And I'd like to thank Olivier for his excellent work preparing this report. Any comments? The commission no.”
  Road transport environmental policy · Powertrain choice: EV-only pathway vs. equal support for hybrids, e-fuels, H2
• “And I don't want to do that because I'm not there for this purpose. So or in the elevator, sometimes there are lobbyists going to different colleagues. I don't know that they are there, but I'm talking with them and I have no interest to talk about certain issues of lobbying. So only the possibility to meet a lobbyist does not mean that I'm talking about legislation, that I'm talking about any kind of interests. So this recommendation is not so pragmatic for us because we meet every day, a lot of people. And sometimes I even don't understand where they are coming from, but they try to present themselves. I have no clue from institutions, from the institution. Perhaps some other colleagues would know it from other committees. But as I'm not familiar with every content of every committee and every legislation, I would never have the possibility to be able to to to know that. And for the lobbyists, neither. This is so this would be, I think, an over requirement that is not useful, but I would have some other. You had some very interesting findings. Um, the fact that resistance can self-declare which categories they belong to is very problematic from my point of view.”
  Regulation of NGOs in Europe
• “So thanks a lot. Now I was informed that there is no Q&A at all at the end, so that I'm overtaking the whole meeting. I was not informed about that. This is why I first have to start now again to say I think that you agree with the adoption of the agenda and that there are no objections. I hope that this is not the case because if not, she would have not been able. So we have already heard what from the side of the Commission is planned to the first two points because we have two points: the first is SG reform, and I think there will be a lot of questions by the colleagues because, may I be frank directly, all what you present is nice on the surface but still the Parliament has no possibility to get really an in-depth information what is going on. Payment is not disbursement for us. Payment is payment but it's not the disbursement of the money. You know that we are mostly interested in how the money is really spent and what kind of impact it does have on the economy and on the workplaces and all of this. So this is why I would first like to give the floor to EPP Isabelle and Humea.”
  Accounting and auditing of EU budget
• “Thank you very much. Just one, one, one remark. So I think the first step of the conditionality mechanism was just shortly for a short time delay raised. It's not a conservative government. It was a former socialist government. To say, to be frank, because the colleague said that only conservative governments would be part. So all member states are under the conditionality mechanism, not 1 or 2. But there was the problem with the anti-corruption prosecutors that were, let's say, deleted. And now we are facing huge cases of corruption in different authorities that are related to either. So I would be very happy if you could give a written answer on the whole complex, perhaps how the conditionality mechanism and the new steps of the Commission are related now to these payment requests that are given to you, because I think there there could be an interlink or there should be an interlink, but it is not needed now because it's a very complicated area. Thank you very much. Some colleagues, do you have somebody any further questions? I don't have the impression that you will be facing further questions. May we? Thank you very warmly for that. You have been here. And best regards to Valdis Dombrovskis. Uh, I don't think that he will face further questions when he's coming now. And, um, I think. Uh, that we have no further comments. May I thank warmly my co-chair, if you would like to raise the floor for some final words.”
  EU Supervision of the Rule of Law
• “So thanks a lot. Um, um, as I had nearly the same questions as Olivier Chastel had. So I just repeat this type of questions and how the cost could be a little bit reduced. Because at the moment I have the impression that nearly all projects related to premises are quite expensive. And so first I would like to hear perhaps the answers and then afterwards, uh, perhaps it's necessary to have further questions.”
  Budget for EU politicians
• “The budgetary assessment, therefore, includes several amendments to the Commission's text to make sure the mobilisation procedure of DGs remains as it is today. It should be our common aim to make sure that the EGF retains its nature as a standalone, thematic special instrument that is implemented with the close involvement of the budgetary authority. And, um, I just would like to say that for the EPP, we join this, uh, Very clearly the proposals of the Commission to undermine the democratic oversight of the Parliament, not only in this case, are unacceptable. And I think that we not only have to play our role, but we have to make clear that the Parliament is not a nice decoration. A parliament has a scrutiny role, a parliament has a codecision role. And we expect the respect of the commission for the Parliament. So and for democratic rules at the moment I have severe doubts in this. So this is why I just join the opinion of Johan van Overtveldt. Uh, and, uh, want to make clear that this Parliament expects that democratic scrutiny, codecision and decision taking or making of this Parliament and of the budgetary authority is Respected. So, um, this was shortly and friendly, unfriendly. But, um, quite clearly, I think, for the position of the EPP. And if the colleague Lupu would like to raise the floor, uh, then I would give the floor to the president.”
  Conditions to access EU budget