NOVEMBER 2007
AGENCE FRANCE PRESSE 25.10.07
EU's Galileo satnav scheme needs millions more next year: MEPs
STRASBOURG (AFP) - The EU's troubled Galileo satellite navigation network, meant to rival the US Global Positioning System (GPS), needs millions more euros next year than planned, European MPs warned Thursday.
Last July, under the European Union's 2008 budget proposals, the amount to be given to the ambitious project was set at 151 million euros (216 million dollars - £106m).
But deputies in the EU Parliament, who share budgetary control with the 27 EU member states, deemed this sum grossly insufficient.
At their first reading of the budget bill in the Strasbourg parliament, they bumped the figure up to 890 million euros (=£623), an amount they said was necessary if the project is to be deployed in 2013 as planned
The problem is that the extra 739 million euros (£517) would bust the scheme's projected EU funding for the entire 2007-2013 period, thereby requiring some difficult revisions of the bloc's financial plans for the period.
Deputies, who understand these problems perfectly well, wanted to force member states to demonstrate their political backing for the Galileo project, parliamentary sources explained.
"Parliament is asking for this project to be run properly and that the funding shortfalls should be found from the community budget," said Finnish Liberal Kyosti Virrankoski during a parliamentary debate earlier.
"Parliament cannot accept jeopardising Galileo ... which is an indispensable strategic tool," added French socialist MEP Catherine Guy-Quint.
Work on Galileo, supposed to be a showcase for Europe's technical prowess, has stalled as cost over-runs pile up, private contractors bicker and member nations push their own industrial interests.
The European Commission published proposals last month to raise an extra 2.4 billion euros (3.4 billion dollars) for the 30-satellite project, mainly using unspent money intended for farm subsidies from the EU's joint budget.
In more general terms the Strasbourg parliament is calling for a higher EU budget for 2008.
In July, member states backed an overall budget of 119.4 billion euros (£83.6bn) 3.4 percent up on 2007 but 2.1 billion euros (£1.5bn) less than the European Commission had proposed earlier.
The MEPS had called for the budget figure to be set at 124.1 billion euros (£86.8bn)
EU REFERENDUM Blog 26.10.07
( - - - the MEPs want to throw ¤890 million at the EU's bankrupt Galileo satellite positioning system, when the actual 2008 budget has been set at ¤151 million. They deem the lower provision "grossly insufficient" if the system is to be deployed in 2013 as planned.
However, this extra ¤739 million is equivalent to the budget allocated for the entire 2007-2013 period, which means even more money would have to be found in the future. But, we are told, the MEPs are trying to force member states to demonstrate their political backing for the Galileo project
Contrary to the wishes of the UK and others, the MEPs want to see funding shortfalls found from the community budget ," with French socialist MP Catherine Guy-Quint declaring that, "Parliament cannot accept jeopardising Galileo," adding that it "is an indispensable strategic tool."
How easy it is to argue thus when all you are doing is spending other peoples' money, for which you have no responsibility for raising and for which you are not held accountable by your electorate. It would not occur to any of these profligates, therefore, that if they abolished themselves and their two parliament buildings, the EU could afford the extra ¤739 million, and still have change, without any overall increase in the budget.
When you think of it, they owe it to the cause. After all, no one could accuse their Parliament of being an "indispensable strategic tool".