In the EU context, performance budgeting has risen in prominence, both in the management and control of spending from the EU budget and (recently) the RRF, and there has been extensive discussion on how to measure the results and impacts of public spending, going beyond just looking at direct outputs.
For 2021-2027, that performance link was further developed, notably through the introduction of a new 5+2 approach where the first five years of the budget will be programmed initially, with funding for the remaining two years contingent on an in-depth mid-term review and a reprogramming process taking account of progress in achieving objectives, the socio-economic situation and new challenges identified in the country-specific recommendations. With the adoption of the Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF), which links funding disbursement to the achievement of milestones and targets (M&Ts), the shift towards performance budgeting was reinforced through a ‘financing not linked to costs’ approach (FNLTC)
Against this background, the objective of this study is to deepen and further existing research on the performance framework for the EU budget, and to lay the groundwork for mapping and assessing policy options for an updated performance framework for the next programming period. The study aims to:
- describe the current architecture of the performance framework for the EU budget, including budgetary mainstreaming;
- assess the effectiveness of the current architecture, while identifying best practices and limitations, distinguishing between the intrinsic difficulties of using the performance budgeting methodology to anticipate impacts and the empirical demands of the approach;
- inform the EP on avenues to be explored for improving it in the future, including enhancing the role of the EP in bringing the results of the scrutiny of performance information (PI) to bear on budgetary decision-making, and more broadly on ensuring a high qualitative level of scrutiny, democratic accountability and deliberation.
