Policy Brief: New Resources of the EU Budget

Our researcher Vít Havelka, in his article "New Sources of the EU Budget", which was created under the Think Visegrad in Brussels project, writes about the new own resources of the EU budget, which are currently being discussed at the European level. The text specifically discusses why the reform of own resources is necessary and what are the positions of the various EU institutions and member states on these proposals. It concludes with a reflection on the Czech position, including an outlook on how it might evolve depending on the course of the negotiations.

The reasoning for implementation of new EU budget resources varies across the actors, who all have their inherent interests. The European Parliament predominantly wants to gain more power through a control of financing that is independent from the national governments. In the current political set-up, the EP does have budgetary powers in both MFF and the annual budget; yet, it does not possess similar powers to national parliaments in case of national financial plans. A potential increase in EU own resources might give the institution an extra leverage in the negotiations about, how the entire EU budget could be spent.

The whole article is available under the PDF button.

Vít Havelka
Senior Research Fellow

Expertise: EU institutional relations with member states, europeisation, transformation role of EU