The EP special committee on preparation of the financial framework 2014-2020 will hold its inaugural meeting, on 8 July in Strasbourg. The chairmanship is likely to go to German Social Democrat Jutta Haug and Spanish Conservative Salvador Garriga is expected to be named rapporteur. Several vice-chairs will also be selected for the committee, which has 50 members (half from the Committee on Budgets – see list in Europolitics4001) and will begin its work in July. Its objective is thought to be to put a final report to the vote in plenary by June 2011, before the European Commission presents its formal proposal on the new financial framework.

Commission President José Manuel Barroso said, on 7 July in Strasbourg, that his institution would first publish in September a “general policy document on revision of the financial perspectives”. This would be an initial discussion “on the principles and key objectives” of the budget reform. The paper will give the Commission the chance to respond, at least in theory and behind schedule, to the mandate given by the member states in December 2005 to present “in 2008 or 2009 an in-depth revision of the EU’s expenditure and revenue”.