European Court of Auditors Publishes Opinions on Horizon Europe and the European Competitiveness Fund

The European Court of Auditors has published two closely linked Opinions on the proposed EU budget framework for 2028–2034: Opinion 02/2026 on the future Horizon Europe programme and Opinion 01/2026 on the new European Competitiveness Fund (ECF). While both documents follow a similar structure and address common cross-cutting issues such as EU added value, simplification, performance and audit arrangements, they assess two distinct but interdependent legislative proposals put forward by the European Commission.

Taken together, the Opinions highlight that Horizon Europe and the ECF are designed as complementary instruments covering the entire innovation cycle — from excellent research and collaborative R&I to scale-up, industrial deployment and strategic technologies. The Court therefore explicitly recommends reading both Opinions in parallel, as many governance choices, funding rules and implementation risks only become visible when the two proposals are assessed together. This joint reading is essential for understanding how EU research and innovation funding is expected to translate into competitiveness, resilience and industrial impact in the next Multiannual Financial Framework.