Even more money than usual could now come from the EU after it set up a one-off recovery fund following the coronavirus outbreak. Alongside this, there is still the ‘normal’ seven-year budget, started in 2021. Some of the money comes from direct EU programs, but most of it comes indirectly through national governments.
The procedure is that the tenders must be published first, which are largely pre-financed by governments. After implementation, the invoices are sent to Brussels, and finally the euros come into the treasury. Moreover, the money can be called up for three years after the end of the budget period. This is why most of the money coming in now is from the previous period, until 2020, because the extra three years expire this year.
The suspensions will not affect agricultural and rural development funding from the Common Agricultural Policy. The specific agricultural policy plan was approved last November, but tenders have not yet been launched. They will only be released gradually in consultation with the sector.
Also expected are the ‘regular’ budget direct catch-up funds, which are not managed through national governments, and even a fraction of the €22 billion in indirect catch-up funds – most of which have been suspended.
What are we not getting and why?
The €5.8 billion (roughly HUF 2,200 billion) non-reimbursable part of the recovery fund is also open for applications because the spending plan was also approved by Member States last December, but the money cannot yet be called up from the EU.
This would require the completion of 27 “super-milestones,” which are part of an interlinked system. Most of them also block part of the ‘regular’ budget for catch-up funding (roughly €6.3 billion, or nearly €2,400 billion) because of the (rule-of-law) conditionality mechanism; in this procedure, public interest trusts and universities that have been converted into trusts have also been banned from entering into any grant contract.
Four judicial super-milestones have separately, as “horizontal conditions,” blocked almost all of the €22 billion of frozen catch-up money. Even on top of these, there are horizontal conditions that are an extra obstacle to some of the catch-up money, roughly €2.5 billion.