The European Commission is almost certain to delay until after the summer any decision on whether or not to suspend Spain and Portugal's access to European funds.
The two countries are in the naughty corner for failing to hit previous financial targets and for not cutting public spending with sufficient dedication and enthusiasm.
Both could be fined up to 0.2% of GDP and lose billions of free EU euros.
The Commission is to decide on the fines at its end of July meeting, the last one before the commissioners’ summer holidays, but it will delay a decision on suspending access to funds until after the summer break.
This news is from a vice president of the European Commission, Maros Sefcovic who said the EU rules mean that the Commission must decide on the fines by the beginning of August, but that the other business can wait a while.
It is big money at stake with the 2014-2020 grant to Spain a sizeable €37.4 billion, and a further €25.8 billion for Portugal.
In fact the rules dictate that only 50% of these funds can be withheld, but even so, this would be a blow to those in Portugal expecting to receive grants, much of which might be spent on the proposed projects.
The fines situation might not be as bad as everyone is making out as the EU can set a fine at €0 if it is happy that Portugal is making an effort.
Sefcovic reiterated that the Commission had made no decision yet on fines, and said these could yet be reduce or waived.
The letter recently sent by Portugal's finance minister to the Commission, which claimed that imposing sanctions on Portugal would be a mistake and would have "a highly negative impact" on the Portuguese support for the European project, simply shows his inexperience as Portugal is not that important to the European project as the country has an underdeveloped economy and a population of just over 10 million.
