The European Court of Auditors (ECA) issued on Wednesday two opinions on the new spending rules and revenue streams in next Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF), the long-term EU budget for 2028 to 2034. The budget amounts to almost €2 trillion or 1.26% of the EU's gross national income, compared to 1.13 % in the previous period.
As previously reported, the increase is less than it appears, since 0.11 % of the budget is intended for the repayment of the loans that the EU took during the Covid-19 pandemic to finance the recovery or NextGenerationEU.
Excluding the repayments, the increase to 1.15 % was not considered as massive by the Commission in current prices (2025). In real terms, the MFF will amount to €1.8 trillion in 2028.
The Commission proposed that the share of the EU budget that it manages together with the Member States should be reduced by 20 percentage points. However, a significant increase in the Commission’s direct and indirect management may pose administrative challenges and also affect the geographical distribution of spending, according to the ECA's opinion on spending rules.
The Commission also proposed to make the new MFF more streamlined, flexible and impactful by reducing the number of programmes from 52 to 16 under four headings. The ECA warns that the actual extent of simplification for the final recipients of EU money will depend on how the implementation rules and control arrangements are designed and implemented in practice.
As regards revenues, the Commission proposed five new 'own' resources to balance the new MFF, besides the current main revenues, based on Gross National Income (GNI) and value-added tax. For the first time, the budget includes revenue based on non-collected e-waste and tobacco duties.
These new own resources are estimated to generate revenue of approximately €58.5 billion per year (in 2025 prices). The most controversial new income is the Corporate Resource for Europe (CORE), established as an annual lump-sum contribution by large companies operating and selling in the EU, with an annual net turnover above €100 million. How much it will generate was not specified.
The ECA questions whether the EU’s new own resources will reduce the burden on member states. In the opinion on revenue streams, the auditors found that 77 % of the additional annual revenue will continue to be financed from national budgets. They warn that the own resources system would be more complex. Levying a financial fee on companies might go against EU competitiveness goals.
“Our opinions on the MFF are by their nature technical, as they comment on the Commission proposal that is itself technical,” an ECA spokesperson told The Brussels Times. “Moreover, the opinions have no recommendations, unlike our audit reports, but we draw the attention of EU’s co-legislators to some important points, so they can consider them in their upcoming negotiations on the MFF package.”
The two opinions on spending rules and novel ways to finance the budget can be seen as overarching and are part of a series of 12 opinions on next MFF. The ECA has recently issued opinions on the European Competitiveness Fund and Horizon Europe. More opinions on among others the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) and the European Fund for Strategic Investments will follow in February and March.
