The European Parliament’s budgets committee has supported the transfer of €21 billion of unspent money from the 2014 budget, which will ensure funds remain available for research.
At a meeting on 1 April, MEPs voted in favour of the European Commission’s proposal to amend the 2014-20 budget, called the Multiannual Financial Framework, to make use of these funds. According to the proposal, the level of commitments in the 2015 budget will increase by €16.5bn, and by €4.5bn in 2016.
In 2014, money went unspent across several programmes including the European Regional Development Fund—which funds regional R&D and innovation—as well as other programmes under Structural Fund, and the Cohesion Fund. This was because of the late agreement on the overall budget package, which meant many of the programmes were not up and running in time.
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