Amendments to the proposed Regulation establishing a Social Climate Fund (FF55 package)

Introduction

• We welcome the Fund. We appreciate the fact that the European Commission has introduced distributional effect considerations throughout the ‘Fit for 55 Package’. We welcome the idea of creating a stand-alone fund like the Social Climate Fund that aims at channelling resources to targeted households via a lump-sum and/or via projects supporting electrification, like energy efficiency, integration of renewables or electric-based transport solutions. 

• The ambition of the fund requires a bigger financial envelope. With the current scope of the Fund, additional resources will be needed if the aim is not only that of supporting families through the years in which they will be the most exposed to price increases but also to help them bear the initial cost of switching to electric-based solutions for heating, transport, or cooking. Additional financing should not come from taxes and levies on the power sector nor from taking away resources from established programmes to support decarbonisation and electrification in the MFF. 

• The Fund is an important element of the Package and the Just Transition Framework. The Fund is one of the essential instruments proposed for this mitigation, aiming at ensuring that citizens are supportive of the energy transition. 

• The articulation of lump sum and electrification-based projects. We would like to propose that in the technical guidance to support Member States during implementation the Commission provides clarity on how to best articulate the combination of lump sums and support to the projects. 

• Essential to focus on electrification. We particularly welcome the focus on electric-based projects, which is key to the Electric Decade. The higher decarbonisation ambition that is articulated across different proposals of the package, especially in end-use sectors like heating and cooling and transport needs to go hand in hand with support for lower income households.

• Governance respectful of the subsidiarity principle. We welcome the fact that the governance of the Fund is similar to the Just Transition Fund. The architecture of the initiative is set at EU level, but it is ultimately up to Member States to articulate the plans and related measures sponsored by the Fund, as the main competence on social policies lies with them, in accordance with the principle of subsidiarity.