Activities of George LYON related to 2012/2000(BUD)
Plenary speeches (1)
General guidelines for the 2013 budget: Section III - Commission (debate)
Amendments (7)
Amendment 3 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1
Paragraph 1
1. Acknowledges the fiscal consolidation efforts undertaken by Member States with the aim of addressing the crisis; underlines the fact that the EU will never be able to respond properly to the crisis without common instruments, such as automatic sanctions and the Commission's right to take legal action in a deficit procedure, but also the common EU-funded programmes and the resources to make them work;
Amendment 11 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 3
Paragraph 3
3. Recalls that the European Union’s budget is one of the most important instruments of solidarity between Member States and between generations, and that it provides a clear added value, given its extraordinary impact on the real economy and daily lives of European citizens; recalls that if the Union’s policies were to be financed solely by Member States, their costs would skyrocket and that, seen in this light and if used in a synergetic manner, the European budget intrinsically represents a clear common saving for the wellbeing of all;
Amendment 24 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 6
Paragraph 6
6. Stresses that such support would be instrumental in preventing SMEs from cutting down their investments, in particular on research and development, while at the same time promoting employment and ensuring that skills are conserved, thus helping to unleash SMEs’ innovation potential, which is essential to the EU’s prosperity and to the creation of a knowledge-based society; further stresses in this context the necessity to further simplify the application procedure for EU-funded programmes;
Amendment 41 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9
Paragraph 9
9. Stresses that well coordinated, coherent and timely implementation of political commitments and priorities shared at national and EU level requires national and European institutions to work together to prioritise public spending on growth areas, assess ex ante the effects of planned actions, increase synergies between them and ensure that they have a positive impact by removing obstacles and tapping into under-utilised potential; underlines its commitment toin this regard, underlines the importance of continuing to organise interparliamentary debates on the common budgetary orientations of the Member States and the Union in order to ensure that there is coordination between the national and EU budgets in the general framework of Parliament’s activities in the European Semester; for this purpose, undertakes to organise bi-annual interparliamentary meeting, taking place before the Spring Summit, the presentation by the Commission of its draft Budget, and the start of the national budgetary procedures in Member States, which would be fully dedicated to the European Semester, with a view to debating economic and budgetary policy coordination with national parliaments;
Amendment 69 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 19
Paragraph 19
19. Is therefore extremely worried about the situation of payments in 2012 and calls for a solution to be found as early as possible this year, so as not to postpone the problem once again, to 2013; takes the view, moreover, that such use of the upcoming year’s appropriations to fund current needs is bad financial management and infringes the principle of budget annuality; expresses serious concerns that this practise undermines the zero-debt- policy of the Union;
Amendment 77 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 22
Paragraph 22
22. Welcomes the agreement reached on financing the additional costs of ITER in December 2011; urges the Commission to respect the joint conclusions in this agreement in their entirety and to make concrete proposals on the amount of EUR 360 million in the 2013 draft budget, making full use of the provisions laid down in the Financial Regulation and in the IIA of 17 May 2006 and excluding any further ITER-related revision of the MFF; reiterates its strong conviction that securing the amount of EUR 360 million in the 2013 budget should not impair the successful implementation of other EU policies during this last year of the programming periodespecially those that contribute to achieving the goals of the EU 2020 strategy (R&D, Innovation, entrepreneurship, employment, education) during this last year of the programming period and specifically requests that possible redeployments should not infringe upon these budgetary priorities;
Amendment 85 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 24
Paragraph 24
24. Takes note of the letter dated 23 January 2012 from the Commissioner for Budgets and Financial Programming expressing the Commission’s willingness to reduce the number of posts in its establishment plans by 1 % as early as 2013; recalls the Commission’s intention of reducing the staffing in EU institutions and bodies by 5 % as compared to 2013 by 2018, and recalls that this is to be seen as an overall goal; recalls that any change of the establishment plan has direct impact on the budget and should in no way compromise the budgetary prerogatives of the Committee on Budgets and of the European Parliament; considers that any short- term or long-term reduction of staff should take full account of, inter alia, the Union’s legal obligations and the institutions’ new competences arising from the treaties;