The European Parliament agreed to changes to ceilings in the EU’s Multiannual Financial Framework for 2014-2020 on Wednesday, to help fund 300 state-managed programs, in all EU member states, that started too late to qualify for EU funding in 2014. These changes would allow €21.1 billion in unused commitment appropriations to be carried over from 2014 to 2015-17.

Parliament gave its consent to the changes by 591 votes to 24, with 28 abstentions.

The changes were requested by the European Commission, and have been informally and unanimously approved by the Council of Ministers. The €21.1 billion in uncommitted appropriations, representing 15% of the 2014 budget, were for 300 programs (47% of all programmes) in all member states. These programs could not start on time in 2014 due to delays in approving the rules governing them, which in turn delayed the drawing up of national programs.