Dublin: Ministers responsible for regional funding met at Dublin Castle on 14 and 15 September 2026 to argue over the architecture of cohesion policy 2028-2034, and the informal gathering under the Irish Presidency exposed how far the member states, the European Parliament and the regions still stand from one another. Jack Chambers, Ireland’s Minister for Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation, chaired the talks, which Executive Vice-President Raffaele Fitto attended for the Commission.
The dispute over cohesion policy 2028-2034 centres on the national and regional partnership plans that the Commission proposed as the backbone of the next long-term budget. Under that model, each government would negotiate a single plan with the Commission covering cohesion, agriculture and several other policies, and payments would depend on meeting agreed milestones rather than on reimbursing invoices. Supporters argue that the approach cuts paperwork and ties money to reform. Critics see it as a shift of power from regions to national treasuries.
The European Parliament has already rejected the proposed architecture, and the European Committee of the Regions has set conditions to limit what it calls the recentralisation of European funds. Mayors and regional presidents fear that finance ministries will steer money toward national priorities such as defence or energy, leaving lagging regions with less say over investments that once came to them through their own operational programmes.
Ministers in Dublin discussed two questions. The first concerned how cohesion policy can strengthen European competitiveness without abandoning its founding task of narrowing gaps between rich and poor regions. The second concerned the move to a performance based model. The Presidency also asked delegations how to align investment in economic development with spending on employment, reskilling, education and social inclusion, areas that the European Social Fund has traditionally covered.
Tony Murphy, President of the European Court of Auditors, presented his institution’s analysis of the opportunities and risks in the Commission’s proposals. Auditors have repeatedly warned that performance based funding can make it harder to trace where money actually goes, a concern that echoes lessons from the Recovery and Resilience Facility.
The financial stakes are large. The Commission’s proposal foresees around €450 billion for economic, social and territorial cohesion, including fisheries and rural communities, with a minimum of €218 billion ring fenced for less developed regions. Those guarantees reassure eastern and southern member states, but they do not settle who decides how the money is spent.
Informal councils adopt no conclusions, so the Dublin meeting changed no legal text. Its value lies in the signals it sends to negotiators before the long-term budget talks intensify this autumn. The Council’s meeting page lists the agenda, and the next formal General Affairs Council on cohesion will show whether cohesion policy 2028-2034 keeps a regional voice or becomes a national instrument.
