EU BUDGET: PREPARATIONS FOR TRIALOGUE ON BUDGET GUIDELINES FOR 2000.

Preparations for the Preliminary Draft Budget for the year 2000 mark a new departure in that next year will be the start of the financial perspective for the 2000-2006 period, and it is impossible at this stage of the proceedings to know if the European Commissioner responsible, Erkki Liikanen, or his possible successor, will be able to present a draft in April as planned. In the intervening period, the Parliament and the Council of Ministers have given their verdicts on the budgetary guidelines the European Commission adopted last February 4 (see European Report No 2380).In the countdown to a plenary session vote on March 23, the Parliament's Committee on Budgets proceeded, on March 11, to adopt a report by Jean-Louis Bourlanges, which sees the guidelines as fitting in with the continuity of previous austerity budgets, while pointing to certain new departures. He also stresses the context in which the procedure finds itself, hallmarked by a change in the legislature and the possibility of having to invoke Article 203 of the Treaty in the absence of a new Inter-Institutional Agreement (see separate article in this Section). Against this background, the Parliament maintains its determination to adopt a Budget for the year 2000, one that seeks to retain the institution's powers and take account of what will be its political priorities, irrespective of the financial framework decided upon.The Committee on Budgets calls on the next Parliament to contemplate promoting forms of coordination with national Parliaments' specialist bodies so as to reflect the joint constraints of the budgetary stability pact. The report expresses its concern at the way the situation is shaping up for amounts remaining to be cleared in categories 4, 3 and 2, which represent 243%, 142% and 110% respectively of the commitments at the end of 1998. The report also calls for appropriate steps to be taken so the 2000 Budget includes at least 50% of the amounts remaining to be cleared in order to clear the cost of the past. The Parliament is also loathe to see Category V (Personnel) visited...