Five EU nations call for major cuts to 2028-2034 budget

Leaders from Germany, Denmark, the Netherlands, Austria, and Finland have issued a joint call for significant cuts to the European Union’s proposed 2028-2034 budget. In a joint article published in Politico, the leaders argued that the European Commission’s 2 trillion euro proposal does not align with current economic and political realities.

The five nations are advocating for a reduction of several hundred billion euros, suggesting that new priorities such as security, defense, competitiveness, and innovation must be funded by reprioritizing existing expenditures rather than adding to them. They emphasized that the EU must demonstrate the same fiscal discipline that member states are currently exercising to control their own public finances.

Furthermore, the leaders expressed opposition to increasing staff within EU institutions and rejected the use of common EU-level borrowing to fund new spending. They highlighted that repayments for debt incurred through the post-pandemic recovery fund are expected to cost approximately 170 billion euros between 2028 and 2034, creating a significant financial burden. These five countries collectively finance roughly 40 percent of the EU budget and provide approximately 70 percent of the bilateral support provided by EU members to Ukraine.