Shared governance of strategies, priorities and policies for an efficient use of EU Budget and implementation of EU priorities

06 May 2025 Open letters, position papers, Policy and Governance

The Local Alliance – a coalition of Europe’s eight leading city and regional networks – share a vision for the next EU budget (2028–2034) to become a strong, comprehensive tool for a democratic, just, climate-neutral, secure and competitive Europe. This position paper has been developed in the framework of the European Commission’s consultations on the next EU budget (EU’s next long-term budget (MFF) – implementing EU funding with Member States and regions) and represents the joint position of the networks part of the Local Alliance.

Local and regional governments* are key partners in the implementation of the EU budget and are essential to achieving a prosperous Europe, where people want to live, work and thrive. As Europe faces unprecedented challenges, including climate change and geopolitical threats, the Local Alliance makes
it clear that closer collaboration across all levels of government is critical for success.

This position paper focuses on multilevel governance, urging a step-change in how multilevel governance is applied to the EU budget. Multilevel governance should be fully mainstreamed across all relevant elements of the next EU budget – from the earliest design of the MFF, through program planning and implementation, to monitoring and evaluation. To ensure achieving EU’s objectives for and in all territories, the Local Alliance calls on the European Commission to:

Include local and regional governments in the MFF design and decision-making
Empower local governments in implementation and monitoring of EU funds
Align multilevel governance structures between sectoral legislation and MFF
Ensure effective funding delivery and accessible finance at the local level

Read the position paper

This position paper has been developed in the framework of the European Commission’s consultations on the next EU budget (EU’s next long-term budget (MFF) – implementing EU funding with Member States and regions) and represents the above-mentioned networks’ joint position.

It is complemented by two other position papers:

The Local Alliance – a coalition of Europe’s leading local and regional governments: ACR+, CEMR, Climate Alliance, Energy Cities, Eurocities, FEDARENE, ICLEI Europe and POLIS, – is an informal coalition aiming at ensuring that our constituencies have the competencies and resources to implement and reinforce Europe’s resilience, competitiveness and decarbonisation.