Focus on EU budget size keeps environment off agenda

The collapse of last week’s EU budget talks could prove to be a blessing in terms of green spending, by allowing more time to improve the environmental quality of the package, green groups have suggested.

The talks collapsed because member states could not reach agreement on how big the budget should be.

That dispute kept important environmental financial instruments like the LIFE programme off the agenda at last week’s summit, meaning the green detail of the budget remains to be thrashed out by EU premiers when they reconvene in January.