The committee adopted a report by Mrs Jutta HAUG (PES, D) approving the
proposal for a Council decision subject to various amendments. The report
reiterated Parliament's call for an own-resources system which is equitable,
transparent, cost-effective, simple and comprehensible to the public and
said it should be altered in such a way that the EU attains financial
autonomy. It said that, in view of the continuous development and
forthcoming enlargement of the EU, a dynamic reform of the revenue system
was needed which must find new forms of own resources without increasing the
overall burden of taxes and charges on the European taxpayer. Until such
time as the own resources come directly from the citizens, the system should
be based on criteria which best reflect each Member State's ability to
contribute. The system must therefore gradually reduce its dependence on
Member States' contributions and, in the long term, achieve financial
autonomy. A balanced budget was not exclusively a matter of the revenue
side. The committee called for a phasing out of the "correction of budgetary
imbalances granted to the UK" (the British budget rebate). It confirmed that
the total amount of own resources to be made available to the Union to cover
payment appropriations should not exceed 1.27% of Community GNP. The maximum
amount of resources available to finance the EU budget (derived from the
1.27% of GNP laid down in the Interinstitutional Agreement of 6 May 1999)
could not be changed by a simple mathematical operation in application of
the the new statistical system for national accounts, as this would breach
the Interinstitutional Agreement. As to the maximum rate of call on the VAT
resources, the report departed from the Commission proposal and called for
the rate to be reduced to 0.75% in 2001 and 2002, 0.50% in 2003 and 2004 and
0.25% in 2005 and 2006. It called on the Commission to submit a report on
the operation of the own resources system by 1 January 2004. This report
should examine the feasibility of creating new autonomous own resources. The
Commission should then submit by 1 January 2005 a proposal for a new
decision to replace the current decision on 1 January 2007. The new decision
would thus enter into force at the same time as the new Financial
Perspective and would provide for new autonomous own resources to replace
the VAT-based resources.