Keynote speech: The EU Budget over the last 10 years

In the last years, unexpected events such as the economic crisis and the migration crisis caused by the war in Syria and instability in the region created an increasing financial pressure on the EU budget, and made obvious the need for a greater flexibility and budgetary tools in case of emergencies requiring a financial intervention.

In response, several budgetary mechanisms were created or their use enhanced, as a result of attempts to increase the available funding through the use of revolving funds, attracting additional private funds and contributions from the EU member states. However, a consequence of these measures was also an increase in the level of complexity of the EU budgetary architecture, making the EU budget less transparent to the EU citizens and posing challenges for the European Parliament as one of the two arms of the budgetary authority.