CO2 emissions trading has been around for a long time, but it should be expanded and will therefore generate more income.
(Photo: imago images / Future Image)
Brussels The EU states agreed on around 800 billion euros in EU debt in 2020 in order to jointly do something against the crisis. At that time they did not decide how the debts should be paid back. Now the Commission is going to make a proposal.
On Wednesday, the authority wants to present a paper in which three sources of money are listed:
A draft of the proposal is currently circulating in Brussels. This also includes a graph according to which the EU wants to have its debts paid off by 2056.
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In all three cases, the issue is newly incurred taxes. That makes it easier to divert the funds into EU pots.
Increasing the national contributions of the member states, on the other hand, would be very unpopular and could meet with greater resistance. However, it will be very difficult to distribute the taxes in such a way that no Member State feels too disadvantaged.
Debate about CO2 emissions trading
CO2 emissions trading has been around for a long time, but it should be expanded and will therefore generate more income. Diverting funds from this is particularly detrimental to countries that emit a lot of CO2, for example Poland.
A second emissions trading system for the CO2 emitted when heating and driving a car is to be set up, and funds are also to be used to pay off debts. Emissions trading of this kind already exists in Germany, so the revenues are already being generated. So far they have remained in Germany. According to the Commission’s proposal, part of this would be drained – in addition to a quarter of the revenue already earmarked for the EU Climate Social Fund.
The debate about the CO2 border adjustment is already complicated because the instrument is legally controversial and at the same time free CO2 certificates for industry are supposed to be eliminated. If care is now to be taken that as much money as possible is generated for the EU, that would complicate the negotiations.
The OCED countries have agreed on taxes for multinational corporations. Taxes should also be incurred where companies market their products and generate profits. So far, sales have been primarily taxed, which means that only the state in which the company is based benefits.
A common EU framework is also required for the implementation of this OECD agreement. The Commission therefore sees this as an opportunity to generate its own EU income.
It is not yet clear from the draft of the Commission paper which amounts are involved.
For the EU Commission’s plan to work, a consensus with the EU Parliament and the Council, in which the member states are represented, is needed. The MP Markus Ferber (CSU) warns against too long negotiations: “If the Council pushes the debate on own resources back to the never-ending day, we don’t even need to talk about new spending programs,” he said. “You can’t keep announcing new political priorities without also talking about funding.”
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