BRUSSELS, Sept 23 (Reuters) – Greece has proposed that European Union states should create a European Spectrum Union which could use some of the funds raised by future national sales of 6G mobile spectrum for technology investment, easing pressure on the bloc’s budget.
“The potential initial financial scale could be around €12–15 billion,” according to the proposal, developed by the chairman of euro zone finance ministers Kyriakos Pierrakakis and presented to EU ministers on Tuesday.
“At this stage, this is a planning assumption rather than an official valuation or forecast, and does not include any potential future contribution from selected 5G rights,” it said.
If the idea is accepted by the 27 countries making up the EU, the money could help ease the problem of how to finance the EU’s 2028-2034 budget, proposed at €2 trillion – the main source of financing for all of the EU’s main policies.
Negotiations on the financing are tough, because the budget will have to deal with new challenges like more spending on defence and making Europe more competitive, while retaining most of the spending on old policies to support farming and cohesion.
Among other new financing options, rejected by some countries and supported by others, is using a share of the cash that EU governments get from selling CO2 emissions permits to companies and a share of the tax on goods imported into the EU that were made in countries where climate policies are weaker than in the EU.
Other options include a tax on non-collected e-waste, a share of the tobacco excise duty and an annual lump-sum contribution from large firms operating and selling in the EU.
Further proposals include a levy on extreme wealth, on digital services, online gambling and crypto asset capital gains. Ireland will now have to see which of these options, or a mix of them, has a chance to get unanimous support from all 27 EU countries by the next EU summit scheduled for October.
(Reporting by Jan Strupczewski; Editing by Alexandra Hudson)
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