The new EU regional aid commissioner has vowed today to defend plans to boost the bloc's spending after 2006 against demands of EU heavyweights to freeze expenditure.
New EU regional aid commissioner Ms Danuta Huebner
Poland's Ms Danuta Huebner said the EU's historic enlargement into ex-communist Europe required adequate financing from the bloc's next long-term budget, despite fiscal concerns voiced by many old member states.
She was one of 24 commissioners who received their portfolios in the EU executive yesterday from Commission President-elect Mr Jose Manuel Barroso. The new Commission is due to take office on November 1st for a five-year term.
Mr Huebner said that apart from helping impoverished eastern regions, the EU must also secure funds for research, development and job creation to allow it to catch up economically with the United States.
"I will be in the middle of the fight over the budget. . . . My priority will be to launch the catching-up process of poor regions while also securing enough funds for pro-growth initiatives," the Ms Huebner said.
The outgoing Commission of President Mr Romano Prodi proposed this year to increase the EU's 2007-2013 budget to 1.14 per cent of the bloc's Gross National Income (GNI) despite protests from leading paymasters.
Austria, Britain, France, Germany, Sweden and The Netherlands demanded spending be capped at the current level of 1 per cent of GNI, arguing national budgets were overstretched as countries strive to meet EU deficit limits.