Pierre Moscovici of the European Court of Auditors Calls EU Covid Recovery Fund an Unqualified Success

2020 proved disastrous as Covid spread across Europe, bringing lockdowns, curfews and social distancing. Yet a silver lining emerged: EU nations demonstrated strong solidarity, jointly securing vaccines and agreeing on a massive post‑pandemic recovery instrument—the Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF). To date, the facility has allocated €450 billion in grants and loans to member states since 2021. As the RRF reaches its decisive final stage, we spoke with Pierre Moscovici, France’s representative on the European Court of Auditors, to assess its impact.

The European Court of Auditors recently released a report on the EU’s financial health, which includes an evaluation of the RRF’s implementation.

Moscovici noted that establishing the Covid recovery plan was a pivotal decision. He recalled that he and others had long advocated for Eurobonds and joint borrowing to enable collective investment in Europe, but political disagreements among member states and the Commission had blocked such initiatives—until the pandemic made them unavoidable. The resulting instrument, dubbed Next Generation EU, aimed to raise €750 billion through joint borrowing to spur growth and mitigate Covid’s fallout. In his view, it has been an outright success, with countries such as Spain and Italy receiving substantial support and experiencing a rapid rebound.

Moscovici elaborated, asking whether the facility should remain a one‑off measure or become a permanent fixture, and whether it ought to shape the EU’s forthcoming Multiannual Financial Framework. He noted that if the EU wishes to repeat such an effort, it would follow the line advocated by Mario Draghi—author of a landmark report on EU competitiveness—who calls for €1.2 trillion in investments targeting defence and the green transition. To pursue that scale, Moscovici stressed, we must first identify which aspects of the RRF have succeeded and which have fallen short.

Moscovici concluded that the RRF must be judged not just by the volume of funds disbursed but by the tangible outcomes it delivers. That, he said, is precisely the focus of the European Court of Auditors’ ongoing analysis, guided by the motto ‘let’s go to results.’

Turning to broader economic challenges, Moscovici highlighted the debt situation facing both the EU and its member states.

He explained that there are two distinct dimensions: the EU’s projected debt of €1 trillion by 2027, and the national debt burdens of individual countries. Taking France as an example, its debt‑to‑GDP ratio stands at 120 %, translating into annual debt‑service costs exceeding €90 billion. Such obligations crowd out spending on pensions, health care, research, innovation and education, contributing to current crises in schooling and energy prices. While the EU retains its triple‑A rating, the Court of Auditors has warned that its own debt level is substantial, with repayments stretching over decades, necessitating careful stewardship.

Programme prepared by Agnès Le Cossec, Perrine Desplats, Oihana Almandoz and Isabelle Romero

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