Green light to speed up Europe's rearmament
Renew Europe welcomes today's vote by the European Parliament, which gives the green light to a package of EU rules designed to strip away the red tape currently slowing down Europe's defence industry. The "Defence Omnibus" package, is one of the most concrete pieces of legislation to come out of the EU's drive to rebuild its defence readiness since the White Paper for European Defence Readiness 2030.
The reform answers problems that industry and governments across the continent have flagged for years. Under the old rules, authorising a single defence project - building or expanding a factory, a test site or a training facility - could take up to two years in some member states, with no single point of contact and no guarantee of ever getting an answer. Moving finished defence equipment from one EU country to another could take up to a year, held up by a patchwork of national licences that made even close cooperation between allied producers needlessly slow. And a procurement threshold set years ago meant that even routine defence contracts, worth a few hundred thousand euros, had to go through heavy procedures, tying up small and medium-sized suppliers in paperwork rather than production.
Today's vote turns these problems into concrete fixes. Permits for defence projects will now be capped at 42 working days with a single national contact point and automatic approval if authorities miss the deadline. The threshold below which lighter procurement rules apply is quadrupled, and two brand-new EU-wide transfer licences will let certified companies move goods across borders without applying for a permit for every single shipment.
Smaller firms will also face lighter paperwork to access European Defence Fund support, and targeted, case-by-case exemptions from environmental and chemical rules will be possible without lowering Europe's overall standards of protection for safety and the environment.
Lucia Yar (Progressive Slovakia, Slovakia), EP rapporteur on the file “Acceleration of permit-granting for defence readiness projects” stated :
"Europe cannot deter Russia with factories that exist only on paper. This regulation shortens the time needed to turn a defence investment into production capacity. We maintained strong tacit approval despite pressure from the Council. If a national authority misses the deadline, the permit is granted, so no administration can leave a project waiting in silence. We also secured regular monitoring and Commission scrutiny of how the fast-track procedure performs, while existing environmental safeguards stay firmly in place. From now on, permitting speed counts: capitals that use the new procedure well will attract investment, those that stick to slow national routines will see it go elsewhere."
Lucia YarRenew Europe MEP, Slovakia, Progresívne Slovensko
Renew Europe vice-president Anna-Maja Henriksson (Svenska folkpartiet, Finland), EP rapporteur on the file “Intra-EU Transfers and Defence Procurement” added :
“The Defence Omnibus adopted today strengthens EU defence readiness, but we should only consider it a starting point for making our Single Market for Defence ready for the geopolitical reality we live in. Russia will remain a long-term threat to Europe, even after the war in Ukraine ends. We must all understand that there will be no Europe as we know and love it unless we are prepared to defend it. Renew Europe stands ready to continue our successful and ambitious work to strengthen our European defence, deterrence and resilience.”
Anna-Maja HenrikssonRenew Europe MEP, Finland, Svenska folkpartiet
The final text strikes the right balance between making sure that results of research actions remain in the hands of those generating them while enabling fair access rights to Member States helping to finance their development. This is crucial to keep the EU programmes attractive for innovative industries and to guarantee that the EU can efficiently respond to current security challenges.
Renew Europe played an active role throughout the negotiations that shaped these compromises on a highly technical file. Technical as it is, this legislation will have a real, concrete impact in encouraging and accelerating investment across Europe's defence sector, from ammunition plants to shipyards.
Renew Europe recalls that developing a sovereign and capable European defence technological and industrial base remains one of the top priorities of this mandate, and this legislative package is an important building block of that effort.