On the proposal for a regulation establishing the conditions for the implementation of the Union support to the Common Fisheries Policy, to the European Ocean Pact and of the Union’s maritime and aquaculture policy as part of the National and Regional Partnership Fund set out in Regulation (EU) […] [NRP Fund] for the period from 2028 to 2034

3.Reiterates the need to avoid fragmentation and maintain consistent overarching rules, which should apply across the policies covered under the NRP Regulation, while ensuring coherent and consistent implementation provisions;

4.Considers that sufficient resources, including human, technical and IT resources, must be available to the Commission and the Member States from the outset and throughout the entire programming period of the 2028-2034 MFF to ensure an effective implementation of the Union’s agricultural and fisheries policy; stresses, in particular, the need to ensure adequate administrative, scientific, control and audit capacity for the implementation of the CFP; recalls that the appropriations for staff and administrative support expenditure must eventually be realigned with modified operational allocations;

5.Criticises the fact that the dispersion of the CFP spending over several headings is not coherent with the very purpose of the MFF headings, namely to ringfence from each other distinct ‘categories of expenditure’, which, according to Article 312(3) TFEU, must correspond to the Union’s major sectors of activity;

6.Reiterates its call for a sufficiently detailed budgetary nomenclature for CFP funding; deplores the lack of a sufficiently detailed indicative nomenclature for this policy area as proposed in the Legislative Financial and Digital Statement (LFDS) accompanying the NRP Regulation, which even lumps CAP and fisheries into one budget line; considers that this will hamper oversight and the budgetary authority’s ability to accurately steer policy priorities in the annual budgetary procedure; insists that the nomenclature should reflect specific objectives and the breakdown of the various types of intervention and support; recalls that the budgetary nomenclature should ensure the visibility, transparency and traceability of the different components of CFP expenditure; stresses that actions financed through the NRPPs, the EU Facility and external instruments should remain coherent and identifiable throughout the budgetary cycle in order to guarantee transparency, accountability and effective parliamentary oversight; considers that the budgetary nomenclature should allow clear monitoring of the resources allocated and the results achieved; insists, in particular, that budgetary nomenclature and expenditure tracking distinguish CFP expenditure from expenditure related to agreed actions outlined in the Commission’s European Ocean Pact communication or any future related legislation, such as the announced European Ocean Act, to the extent that they do not directly implement the CFP;

7.Recalls the proposal for a regulation on establishing a budget expenditure tracking and performance framework and other horizontal rules for the Union programmes and activities (the ‘performance regulation’), which establishes a single streamlined list for performance indicators and monitoring and evaluation provisions, some of which are relevant for the sectoral CFP regulation; underlines that any change to the architecture, objectives and eligible actions under the programme will need to be appropriately reflected in the monitoring provisions under Annex I of the performance regulation, as part of the process of amending and negotiating that regulation;

8.Notes that several actions supporting the implementation of the CFP are expected to be financed through directly managed Union instruments; stresses that adequate and visible resources should therefore remain available under the EU Facility for activities such as data collection, including biodiversity-related data collection, scientific advice, control and enforcement, maritime affairs, ocean knowledge and other Union-wide actions that cannot be effectively delivered through national allocations alone;

9.Calls for the definition of consistent and harmonised requirements for Member States regarding the prevention, detection, reporting and correction of fraud from the outset of the implementation period, while avoiding unnecessary administrative burdens; stresses that robust control and audit frameworks must be established to protect the Union’s financial interests and that the protection of the Union’s financial interests should be accompanied by regular evaluations of spending effectiveness, ensuring that funds are used efficiently and deliver clear European added value for the fisheries sector and fishing-dependent communities;

10.Calls on the Commission and the Member States to minimise administrative burdens for beneficiaries and to ensure that application, management and control procedures are proportionate, simple and accessible, in particular for small-scale fisheries and aquaculture enterprises, while ensuring that all applicable legislation is fully respected.