text: The SGP was initially proposed by German finance minister Theo Waigel in the mid-1990s. Germany had long maintained a low-inflation policy, which had been an important part of the German economy's robust performance since the 1950s. The German government hoped to ensure the continuation of that policy through the SGP, which would ensure the prevalence of fiscal responsibility, and limit the ability of governments to exert inflationary pressures on the European economy. As such, it was also described to be a key tool for the member states adopting the euro, to ensure that they did not only meet the Maastricht convergence criteria at the time of adopting the euro but kept on complying with the fiscal criteria for the following years. The Excessive Deficit Procedure (EDP), also known as the corrective arm of the SGP, was suspended via activation of the "general escape clause" during 2020–2023 to allow for higher deficit spending; first due to the COVID-19 pandemic arriving as an extraordinary circumstance, and later during 2022-2023 due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine having sent energy prices up, defence spending up and budgetary pressures up across the EU. Despite the EDP suspension in 2020-2023, Romania still experienced the opening of an EDP in April 2020; but only because of existence of a deficit limit breach being recorded already for its 2019 fiscal year, which required corrective action across 2020–2024, to remedy a budgetary imbalance created before 2020. 16 out of 27 member states had a technical SGP criteria breach, when their 2022 fiscal results and 2023 budgets were analyzed in May 2023; because those breaches were exempted due to the finding of temporary and exceptional circumstances, reflected by the activation of the general escape clause, no new EDPs were opened against those member states.