Press Release: Commission assesses stability and convergence programmes of ten EU Member States

On 24 March 2010 the European Commission examined the updated stability and convergence programmes (SCPs) of the Czech Republic, Denmark, Hungary, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Latvia, Malta, Poland, Romania and Slovenia. In line with the Commission's assessments of a first group of fourteen Member States the previous week (see IP/10/288), the evaluation must be seen against the background of the economic and financial crisis which has led to a sharp deterioration of public finances since 2009 and triggered the Council decisions to open Excess Deficit Procedures (EDP) for a large majority of Member States. Within the batch of countries assessed, only Denmark and Luxemburg have kept their general government deficits below 3% in 2009, although their fiscal situation is set to deteriorate markedly in 2010. For most countries 2010 will mark a fiscal consolidation process consistent with the recommendation set out in the EDPs and, in the case of Latvia, Hungary and Romania, with the conditions set out in the international financial assistance programmes. As to the budgetary targets set out in the programmes, the growth assumptions underlying these projections are in several cases optimistic especially in outer years, while the budgetary consolidation strategy is often not sufficiently backed up by concrete measures from 2011 onwards.