Raffaele Fitto, Minister for European Affairs, Cohesion, the South and Pnrr, met yesterday with the President of the European Parliament Roberta Metsola and some European Commission officials in order to save Pnrr funds. A meeting that lasted about 20 minutes in which Fitto tried to probe the feelings of the Union on the possibility of Italy diverting some resources from the Recovery Plan to Repower Eu. The plan presented on May 18, 2022 by the European Commission to “end the European Union’s dependence on fossil fuels from Russia and tackle the climate crisis”. For that, we need the endorsement of the Commission and the European Parliament. “We had a fruitful exchange of views on the main issues on the European agenda”, said Fitto, underlining how the meeting “reaffirmed the common will to collaborate in the interests of the institutions”. Each Member State “can count on new subsidies for EU Repower – said Veerle Nuyts, spokesperson for the European Commission – which can be attributed to the Recovery and Resilience Device. Italy can also ask for a part of these subsidies, there is also the possibility of moving funds from the Brexit adjustment reserve and also a part of the cohesion funds.
However, there is an obstacle to being able to move objectives from one plan to another. Eric Mamer, spokesperson for the European Commission, explained: “The Member States have the possibility of presenting a new chapter within the Pnrr to achieve the objectives of Repower Eu but be careful, it is not a matter of withdrawing money from a chapter to put in another. It is just a matter of integrating an additional thematic dimension». “Good exchange of views this morning between the Italian delegation led by Minister Raffaele Fitto and senior officials of the EU Commission on the Italian Pnrr and on the progress related to the third and fourth payment requests,” added the spokeswoman for the EU Commission , Veerle Nuyts, on Twitter. “In addition, there was talk of how to proceed in the RePowerEU chapter – he highlighted – both parties underlined the need to move forward with the work in progress with the utmost urgency”
The opening in which the government plays the game is the one opened by article 21 of the regulation which provides that, once the Council has approved a plan, the member state may request, in exceptional cases, the modification of specific milestones and objectives if the changes are justified by objective reasons. Therefore, on Wednesday Fitto will present the Report on the implementation of the recovery and resilience plan where the executive indicated 120 items of expenses that present critical elements. The hope is that they will be enough for the European Commission to grant Italy a reformulation of some deadlines or the reallocation of some resources to other expenditure items. The game is still open.
Source: IL Tempo
Emma Fitzgerald is an accomplished political journalist and author at The Nation View. With a background in political science and international relations, she has a deep understanding of the political landscape and the forces that shape it.
