The second day of the EU summit being held in Brussels began today after 11am. On Friday, despite fourteen hours of talks, leaders failed to agree on a new multi-annual budget and a recovery fund to help alleviate the economic effects of the coronavirus crisis. Poland is particularly opposed to linking financial issues with arbitrarily assessed compliance with the rule of law.
“Another matter, which was not really discussed, is the matter of the rule of law. I presented Poland’s position on this matter earlier. We don’t want any kind of arbitrary mechanisms which may lead to a situation under which politically motivated countries would make decisions for us. What’s more, there was a very good decision made by the European Council on the ETS which is the source of our own profits and Poland did not agree with that. We did not agree because it had a character of a regressive fee and Poland, in proportion to its GDP, would have to pay more than other member countries. This is a good decision because there are over 7 billion euro, and if we were forced to do that, then we would have to pay a proportionate contribution to the budget for Europe’s recovery after the coronavirus crisis”, stated the Polish prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki.