The Official Journal of the European Union published on October 29th, a Decision of the European Parliament and the Council of October 22nd, on the mobilisation of the European Globalisation Adjustment Fund (EGAF), in accordance with the Interinstitutional Agreement of May 17th, 2006 between the European Parliament, the Council and the Commission on budgetary discipline and sound financial management.

The European Parliament and the Council, have decided to mobilise 10,770,772 € from the European Globalisation Adjustment Fund (EGAF), for the general budget of the European Union for the financial year 2008, in commitment and payment appropriations.

Early this year, on September 9th, the Commission put forward a proposal for a Decision concerning the mobilisation of the Fund, after analysing the applications submitted by Spain and Lithuania:

• On February 6th, 2008 Spain submitted an application to deploy the Fund in respect of redundancies in the automobile sector, specifically for workers made redundant by Delphi Automotive Systems España, S.L.U. The application has been found to comply with the requirements for determining the financial contributions as laid down in Article 10 of Regulation (EC) No 1927/2006.
• On May 8th, 2008 Lithuania submitted an application to deploy the Fund in respect of redundancies in the textile sector, specifically for workers made redundant by Alytaus Tekstile. The application was found to comply with the requirements for determining the financial contributions as laid down in Article 10 of Regulation (EC) No 1927/2006.

The European Globalisation Adjustment Fund

The European Globalisation Adjustment Fund (EGAF) was created to provide additional support to workers who suffer from the consequences of major structural changes in world trade patterns and to assist their reintegration into the labour market.

In this scope, the Interinstitutional Agreement of May 17th, 2006 allows the mobilisation of the Fund within the annual ceiling of 500 M€.