The Right to Amend and the Government’s Veto in the New Framework for the General State Budget

Abstract

The new regulatory framework integrated by the reform of Article 135 EC and the approval of the EU budgetary rules (Six Pack and Two Pack) has led to significant changes in the approval procedure of the General State Budget. It has also influenced the role played by the Government and Parliament in this procedure. The Government is the only interlocutor with the EU institutions (European Commission), in terms of negotiating the budgetary balance for the following fiscal year (which is currently equivalent to the admissible deficit), so that it is also the first responsible for the fulfillment of the commitments assumed by the Spanish State before Brussels. For this reason, this paper proposes reconsidering the jurisprudential line that in some recent pronouncements of the Constitutional Court (STC 34/2018) has affirmed that the right of veto that Article 134.6 EC recognizes the Government only applies when it comes to parliamentary initiatives (propositions or amendments) that affect Budgets already approved. For our part, we propose to consolidate the practice followed to date in the Committee on Budgets and to clearly recognize that the Government’s right of veto is also applicable to the amendments submitted to the draft Budget Law. And this to understand that it is the only way to ensure consistency between the documents sent to the European Commission (Stability Plan and Budget Plan) and those approved by Parliament (stability objective and General State Budgets).