This document is an excerpt from the EUR-Lex website
Document 52013DC0901
COMMUNICATION FROM THE COMMISSION Assessment of action taken by SPAIN, FRANCE, MALTA, THE NETHERLANDS and SLOVENIA in response to the Council Recommendations of 21 June 2013 with a view to bringing an end to the situation of excessive government deficit, and by BELGIUM in response to the Council Decision to give notice of 21 June 2013
COMMUNICATION FROM THE COMMISSION Assessment of action taken by SPAIN, FRANCE, MALTA, THE NETHERLANDS and SLOVENIA in response to the Council Recommendations of 21 June 2013 with a view to bringing an end to the situation of excessive government deficit, and by BELGIUM in response to the Council Decision to give notice of 21 June 2013
COMMUNICATION FROM THE COMMISSION Assessment of action taken by SPAIN, FRANCE, MALTA, THE NETHERLANDS and SLOVENIA in response to the Council Recommendations of 21 June 2013 with a view to bringing an end to the situation of excessive government deficit, and by BELGIUM in response to the Council Decision to give notice of 21 June 2013
/* COM/2013/0901 final */
/* COM/2013/0901 final */ ANNEX
1.
Introduction
On 21 June 2013,
following the publication of the Commission 2013 Spring Forecast and
assessments by the Commission of Member States' Stability and Convergence
Programmes, the Council decided that a number of steps under the excessive
deficit procedure (Article 126 of the Treaty) were required for Belgium, Spain,
France, Malta, the Netherlands, Portugal and Slovenia[1]. In particular, the
Council reviewed the existing excessive deficit situation of Spain, France, the Netherlands, Portugal and Slovenia. It considered that these Member States had taken
effective action in compliance with Council recommendations under Article
126(7) of the Treaty, and that unexpected adverse economic events with major
unfavourable consequences for government finances had occurred after the
adoption of the original recommendations. Therefore, the Council (following
recommendations from the Commission) considered that for these Member States,
the conditions foreseen in Article 3(5) of Regulation (EC) No 1467/97 were
fulfilled, to issue new recommendations under Article 126(7) of the Treaty. The
Council extended the existing deadlines for correcting the excessive deficit to
2014 for the Netherlands, to 2015 for France, Portugal and Slovenia and to 2016 for Spain. The
Council established a deadline of 1 October for these countries to take
effective action and, (with the exception of Portugal[2]) to report
in detail the consolidation strategy that is envisaged to achieve the targets
in accordance with Article 3(4a) of Council Regulation (EC) No 1467/97[3]. Moreover, on the basis
of a Commission recommendation the Council decided under Article 126(8) of the
Treaty that Belgium had not taken effective action in compliance with the
Council Recommendation of 2 December 2009 to correct its excessive deficit by
2012, and under Article 126(9) of the Treaty to give notice to put an end to
the excessive deficit situation by 2013. Belgium was given a deadline of 15
September to report on the measures taken to comply with this decision in accordance
with Article 5(1a) of Council Regulation (EC) No 1467/97. Finally, the Council
decided (on proposals from the Commission) to open a new excessive deficit
procedure for Malta under Article 126(6) of the Treaty and issued a
recommendation under Article 126(7) to the country, with a view to end the
excessive deficit situation by 2014. The Council established a deadline of
1 October for Malta to take effective action and, in accordance with Article
3(4a) of Council Regulation (EC) No 1467/97, to report in detail the
consolidation strategy that is envisaged to achieve the targets.
2.
Assessment of action taken
According to Regulation
(EC) No 1467/97 and the revised Code of Conduct[4] a Member
State should be considered to have taken effective action if it has acted in
compliance with the Article 126(7) TFEU recommendation. The Code of Conduct
states that the assessment of effective action should in particular take into
account whether the Member State concerned has achieved the annual budgetary
targets and the underlying improvement of its cyclically adjusted balance, net
of one-off and other temporary measures, initially recommended by the Council.
In case the observed budget balance proves to be lower than recommended or the
improvement of the cyclically adjusted balance, net of one-off and other
temporary measures, falls short of the adjustment underlying the target, a
careful analysis of the reasons for the shortfall should be made. In case of a
multi-annual adjustment, the Code of Conduct specifies that the assessment
should mainly focus on the measures already announced or taken in order to
ensure adequate progress toward the correction of the excessive deficit within
the deadline set by the Council. Belgium, Spain, France, Malta, the Netherlands and Slovenia submitted to the Commission reports on action
taken in compliance with the 21 June Council recommendations and Council
decision. In the case of Portugal, which is subject to a macroeconomic
adjustment programme, the reporting of its budgetary strategy takes place in
the context of the programme, in line with Article 10(2) of Regulation (EU) No 472/2013
that entered into force on 30 May 2013. Belgium, Spain, France, Malta, the Netherlands, and Slovenia also submitted their Draft Budgetary Plans for the
forthcoming year to the Commission and the Eurogroup, in line with Regulation
(EU) No 473/2013[5]. The Commission reviewed
the reports on effective action submitted by the Member States and made an
assessment of effective action against the background of the Commission 2013
Autumn Forecast, published on 5 November 2013. In the case of euro area Member States Belgium, Spain, France, Malta, the Netherlands and Slovenia this assessment is also reflected in the
Commission Opinion of 15 November 2013 on the draft budgetary plans of these
Member States[6]. The main
conclusions of this assessment are reflected in the Annex to this Communication.
3.
Euro area Member States subject to a macroeconomic
adjustment programme
Since the entry into
force of Regulation (EU) No 472/2013 on the strengthening of economic and
budgetary surveillance of Member States in the euro area experiencing or
threatened with serious difficulties with respect to their financial stability
on 30 May 2013, the monitoring of euro area Member States subject to a
macroeconomic adjustment programme's compliance with their recommendations
under the excessive deficit procedure – which shall integrate the annual
budgetary targets of the macroeconomic adjustment programme in accordance with
Article 10(2b) of the same Regulation – takes place within the regular
monitoring of the programme provided for by Article 7(4) of the same
Regulation. This Article establishes
that the Commission shall monitor the progress made by a Member State in the implementation of its macroeconomic adjustment programme and inform the EFC of
such progress every three months. In accordance with the constant practice
followed by the Commission, the monitoring of progress made by the concerned Member State in the budgetary area focuses on whether the corrective measures negotiated with
the Member State have been adequately implemented. Evidence of having
effectively taken the measures detailed in the programme for the achievement of
the budgetary targets is therefore considered sufficient to conclude that the Member State concerned has taken effective action to correct the excessive deficit in the
sense of Articles 3 and 5 of Regulation (EC) No 1467/97. This methodology – which
replaces the method described in the Code of Conduct – takes into account the
specific nature of the economic and budgetary discipline applying to Member
States subject to a macro-economic adjustment programme. In particular, it
takes into account the fact that the economic scenario and the measures to be
taken are agreed and detailed.
4.
Conclusions
The Commission has
assessed the budgetary situation and in particular action taken in compliance
with the Council's recommendations (or in the case of Belgium, the decision to give notice). The Commission considers that Belgium, Spain, France, Malta, the Netherlands and Slovenia have taken effective action and that for
these Member States, no further steps in the excessive deficit procedure are
needed at present. Details of the Commission's assessment are reported in the
Commission Opinions on the Draft Budgetary Plans of these Member States.
Finally, the Commission recalls that in the case of Portugal, the last
programme compliance review ended on 3 October 2013, and was concluded
positively. The Commission will
continue to closely monitor budgetary developments in accordance with the
Treaty and the SGP. [1] All documents related to the excessive deficit
procedure of any of the Member States can be found at: http://ec.europa.eu/economy_finance/economic_governance/sgp/corrective_arm/index_en.htm
Note that on
21 June, the Council also issued new recommendations under Article 126(7) to Poland. The Polish authorities submitted a report to the Commission on action taken in
compliance with the recommendation. The assessment of this report is subject of
a Commission recommendation for a Council decision under Article 126(8), also
adopted on 15 November 2013. [2] Portugal will report in the context of its macroeconomic
adjustment programme. In line with Article 10(2a) of Regulation (EU) No 472/2013,
it is exempt from a separate reporting under the excessive deficit procedure. [3] OJ L 209, 2.8.1997, p. 6. [4] “Specifications on the implementation of the
Stability and Growth Pact and guidelines on the format and content of stability
and convergence programmes”, available at:
http://ec.europa.eu/economy_finance/economic_governance/sgp/index_en.htm
. [5] Poland (which is not a euro area Member State) and Portugal (which is subject to a macroeconomic adjustment programme), are not
required to submit a Draft Budgetary Plan. [6] The analysis by the Commission services to underpin
this assessment is published in Staff Working Documents accompanying the
Commission Opinions.