Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2004-09-15-Speech-3-109"
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"en.20040915.6.3-109"2
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"Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, we note with pleasure the evidence of movement in the Council at the weekend, and I am addressing you, Mr Zalm, as one whom I know as a vigorous defender of the former interpretation of the Stability Pact. Pardon me if I exaggerate somewhat, but I sometimes got the impression that you and some of your colleagues had a positively Manichaean way of interpreting it.
There is only ‘either/or’. Some life has been injected into the debate now that it has become evident that there is one thing that we must keep in sight if we want to save the Lisbon strategy, to defend it and advance it, and if its objectives are indeed to be achieved, and that is that all the resources at our disposal – including the Stability and Growth Pact – must be mobilised in making the Lisbon targets realities. Initiating an open-ended inquiry into whether all the measures associated with the Stability and Growth Pact, or all the interpretations placed upon it, were actually conducive to achieving this objective or whether certain modifications or revised interpretations are necessary, that is a step in the right direction, and that, I believe, is what was embarked on at the weekend.
Commissioner Almunia made a very important point about the 3%, which nobody wants to abandon, nor should anyone give up the 60%, but the crucial point is that if we retain this guideline – and our group too knows that it is indispensable – then the Commissioner’s statement to this House to the effect that, because conditions differ from one country to another, no one objective can be imposed, and that each country must be enabled, within its own specific limits, to overcome its difficulties in order to get back on track for the goals when it has problems, is also a step in the right direction, for those who want to save the Pact are thereby put in a position to be able to do so. Those who interpret the Pact only in black-and-white terms – and recent developments in some countries show that this happens – and those who say that there can be no alternative to what we conceived fourteen years ago, overlook the dynamic social and economic changes that are taking place. Commissioner Almunia’s reference to demographic development shows that we must acknowledge and take into consideration the developments of which we were as yet unaware when we first debated the Stability Pact. That means modifying it, modernising it and adapting it to present circumstances, it means securing it and guaranteeing it as the long-term basis of a stable currency. Commissioner Almunia, you have shown courage, and we, in the Socialist Group in the European Parliament, will back you up as you go down this road."@en1
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