On the draft general budget of the European Union for the financial year 2027

12.Stresses that competitiveness policies should remain inclusive and should take into account the diversity of companies in the Union, including differences in size, stage in the business cycle, financing needs and access to financial instruments, while also addressing investment, productivity and employment gaps across regions and sectors; underlines the importance of reliable data for public policy making;

13.Underlines the need for adequate funding for training and capacity-building as an important factor for the Union’s competitiveness, by ensuring that professional skills and know-how are kept; supports investment capacity in innovation and digitalisation of the economy and public administrations;

14.Emphasises the importance of safeguarding financial and economic stability, investment and social cohesion, in particular in sectors facing price pressures, such as affordable housing, energy and climate transition and essential goods; stresses that the competitiveness and cohesion of the Union’s economy are interlinked; emphasises that cohesion policy and the structural funds are a pillar of the Union and that economic convergence is necessary for the development of the internal market, taking into account the different situations and funding needs across the Union; underlines that the Union’s annual budget should consider the European Semester’s recommendations and support effective and flexible use of cohesion policy instruments;

15.Calls for enhanced support for regions affected by deindustrialisation, natural disasters or severe climate pressures;

16. Stresses the need to stimulate economic growth in the Union and highlights the key issue of modernising the Union’s economy, investing to increase convergence and improving access to finance and capital markets and retail investors; recalls that public and private investment should work in parallel and feed into each other; points out that a significant increase in private investment capital is necessary for the effectiveness of budgetary stimulation of the Union’s economy;

17.Reaffirms that the Union budget should contribute to strengthening the Union’s economic and monetary sovereignty, including through adequate funding for the development of the digital euro and the related supervisory and cyber-insurance infrastructure; stresses that the digital euro should operate complementarily to the banking system, ensuring financial stability and deposit protection;

18.Calls for the development of pan-European savings and long-term investment products, with the aim of mobilising private capital towards strategic sectors;

19.Stresses that Union subsidies should lead to concrete added value in practice; calls on the Commission to conduct ex-post assessments as to what extent subsidies granted have significantly benefitted companies and citizens in the Union;

20.Calls for accelerating reforms and increasing productive investment in critical sectors such as defence, decarbonisation, digital and critical infrastructure, while considering national security interests where third-country participation is involved;

21.Encourages the Commission to explore new own resources, in order to equip the Union with adequate means to address common European strategic policies, and in order to cover the costs of repaying NextGenerationEU, financing the Union budget and addressing new industrial priorities as identified in the Draghi report; takes note of Commission’s proposed ‘basket approach’ and stresses that new revenue sources should be adopted with the next MFF and generate around EUR 60 billion annually; reminds that new own resources should be accompanied by efforts to increase the efficiency of the Union’s spending and prevent any misuse of Union funds;

22.Underlines the need to confirm more systematically measures addressing insularity in the design, programming and implementation of the Union’s financial instruments, in accordance with Articles 174 and 349 TFEU, taking into account the specific structural vulnerabilities of islands and the Union’s outermost regions; calls on the Commission to assess the establishment of a mechanism or a dedicated Union fund for territorial continuity, aimed at supporting and ensuring reliable, accessible and sustainable maritime and air connections between island regions and the mainland; highlights that such an instrument would contribute to compensating the permanent additional costs arising from insularity, strengthening economic, social and territorial cohesion, and improving the integration of island regions into the internal market;

23. Stresses the need for sufficient fiscal flexibility and reserves to address geopolitical crises and economic shocks, especially following the economic impact of the crises in the Middle East; stresses the need to strengthen tax justice and the fight against tax evasion and tax avoidance through adequate funding of the competent European Supervisory Authorities;

24. Underlines the strategic role of the European Investment Bank in strengthening the competitiveness, cohesion and strategic autonomy of the Union; calls for its financing capacity to be strengthened, in particular to support investments in innovation, energy security, defence, housing and high-value-added infrastructure, while ensuring financial stability and complementarity with the objectives of the economic governance of the euro area.