Commission defends budget plan ahead of ministerial meeting

Ministers to discuss national support for R&D as budget battle rumbles on

The European Commission has published fresh data to back up its highly contentious proposals for the EU’s 2021-27 budget, which have divided member states and led to warnings that the bloc’s next R&D programme Horizon Europe could be delayed.

A technical briefing from Gert-Jan Koopman, the Commission’s most senior budget official, published on 5 November included an estimate that EU member states would have had to allocate 1.13 per cent of their gross national income to the EU budget in the current 2014-20 budget period to achieve the same funding levels without the UK.