Mr President, firstly I should like to thank the rapporteurs for the budget, Göran Färm and Per Stenmarck, for their thorough and constructive work. I should likewise like to thank the Chairman of the Committee on Budgets, Terence Wynn. I also want to thank Denmark, as the country holding the presidency, for its excellent levels of cooperation, as well as Commissioner Michaele Schreyer. The draft budget meets most of the demands of the Group of the European Liberal, Democrat and Reform Party. It is thrifty and rigorous, and the payment appropriations account for just 1.04% of GNP, while 1.08% has been provided in the financial perspective for expenditure. There is therefore a margin of more than EUR 3 billion in the budget. The draft budget now before us is also available in the form of an activity-based budget. This has to do with the Commission’s administrative reform. The Financial Regulation has been undergoing reforms that will come into effect from the start of next year. This entails a revision of the staff regulations, which Parliament is now debating. This is a complete package of reforms intended to boost administrative efficiency, promote the downward delegation of authority, and clarify personal accountability. These are objectives our group wholeheartedly supports. The undoubted focus of the budget is enlargement. This budget will probably be the last to be drafted for a Union of 15 Member States. There is provision in it for some very important appropriations. The Committee on Budgets is proposing an extra EUR 699 million in pre-accession aid for the candidate countries to make it easier for them to face the challenges of membership. The problem regarding administrative appropriations is insufficient margin for manoeuvre under heading 5. For that reason, the different institutions have started gathering funds out of this year’s budget to be able to pay the costs of accession in advance. For example, Parliament intends to lend the Commission EUR 43 million and the Council EUR 18 million. In other words, levels of cooperation have been exemplary, and my sincerest thanks for that go especially to the rapporteur for the budget, Per Stenmarck. The most serious problem in administering the EU budget is outstanding commitments and unused payment appropriations. Outstanding commitments now amount to around EUR 107 billion, or more than the EU’s total budget for one year. The reason for this is the under-utilisation of payment appropriations. This particularly concerns the Structural Funds and external actions. Last year EUR 18 billion in payment appropriations remained unspent and the figure for the previous year was EUR 11 billion. Under-utilisation on this scale seriously undermines the entire administrative process with regard to the EU budget. In the spring outstanding commitments under the Structural Funds reached EUR 80 billion. Despite this, though, the Council reduced the amount in payment appropriations that was proposed by the Commission. That is why the Committee on Budgets increased payments by more than a billion euros. Our group is calling for a dramatic simplification in the administration of the Structural Funds. With these comments we are prepared to give the draft budget our support.

Political group: ELDR