EC own resources: procedures concerning ceilings

The aim of this proposals was to present a formal alternative to the Commission proposal of 14 September 1993 on the same subject (COM.93/437), which was withdrawn in the meantime. The objective was the same: to ensure, as soon as the ceiling for own resources fixed for the Community was respected, year after year, by Community expenditure, that the mobilisation of financial resources could be allocated in full to the financing of Community policies. However, contrary to the initial proposal, the regulatory and budgetary procedure proposed here would, because it eliminated them, avoid entry of debit balances for resources linked to forecasting errors with regard to the own resources structure as expenditure in the budget. The question of their possible allocation under the own resources ceiling would thus become irrelevant. In order to comply with the commitment vis-à-vis Parliament, when the Interinstitutional Agreement was concluded, the Council was to adopt this regulation before the commencement of the budget procedure for 1995. In practical terms, the proposal consisted in amending the Financial Regulation applicable to the general budget of the Communities in order to take account of the amendments proposed themselves, in the same 'package', to Regulation 1552/89 implementing Decision 88/376/EEC, Euratom on the system of the Communities' own resources, which concerned three points: - provisions concerning the calculation of the refinancing of the budget; - provisions relating to subsequent adjustments to resources; - provisions relating to the particular case where the own resources ceiling is exceeded. �