EU's 4.5-billion-euro budget surplus to be returned to governments

Jul 5, 2011, 13:27 GMT

Strasbourg - A 4.5-billion-euro (6.5-billion-dollar) budget surplus in the European Union's 2010 budget is to be returned to the bloc's member states, the European Parliament decided on Tuesday.

The inability of the EU to spend all of its money is often cited by national governments as a reason to resist requests for increases in the bloc's budget - such as those proposed last week by the European Commission for the 2014-2020 period.

In 2010, unspent money from EU programmes totalled 2.7 billion euros out of a 123-billion-euro budget. The rest of the surplus came from antitrust fines and other sanctions the EU is entitled to levy, as well as due to gains from exchange rate variations.

Germany, the EU's paymaster, is set to receive the biggest share of the surplus, equal to 923 million euros. France is in line to be given back 741 million euros, Britain 639 million euros, and Italy 572 million euros.

Sidonia Jedrzejewska, a Polish EU deputy who steered the parliament's decision, also said that the assembly earmarked 20 million euros to pay for the damage wrought by floods last year in the Czech Republic, Slovenia and Croatia.