Malta’s EU presidency to cost €40 million

The government is budgeting a €40 million spend for the organisation of national activities that will centre around its presidency of the EU in 2017.

Finance Minister Edward Scicluna said on PBS’s Dissett that the cash is to be forked out by the country without any assistance from the EU.

The €40 million bill will cover the six-month presidency of the EU, which will see the country for the first time holding the chairmanship of the EU’s heads of government meetings in the Council, as well as influencing the agenda for the decisions taken by Europe’s 28 prime ministers.

Part of this spend, €20 million, was earmarked in the Budget 2016 programme, and another €20 million will be ring-fenced in the coming budget.

Scicluna told Reno Bugeja that the government “did not intend going overboard” in the money spent for the presidency, for which other member states had spent as much as €80 million before.