As I already mentioned, the EU is just now adopting an important legislative package which will strengthen the stability and growth pact and the macroeconomic surveillance framework of the EU. This package includes, among other things, a directive on the budgetary frameworks of the member countries.
This will be important for what is called the “European semester” – the new annual review of members’ budgets BEFORE their adoption nationally. The package will also make the sanctions enforcing the Stability and Growth Pact more automatic, by the socalled reverse voting mechanism. Both the preventive and the corrective arms of the Stability and Growth Pact will be made stricter.