Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2004-09-15-Speech-3-128"
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"en.20040915.6.3-128"2
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"Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, Commissioner, two or three years ago your predecessor, fellow countryman and party colleague, Mr Solbes, spoke before this House and responded to Mr Prodi’s comments, which have been quoted a number of times today already. The Pact is sufficiently flexible and does not need to be changed. The question we must therefore now ask ourselves is why, two years later, there is a sudden demand for change – one that may appear different, but comes from the same family of parties.
The way I see it, it is to your credit that you are undertaking a final rescue bid for the Pact, because what has become apparent is quite simply that the finance ministers, in particular the German and French finance ministers, may create European legislation, but do not abide by it. I remember how Mr Zalm, the Finance Minister, addressed our committee and, amongst other things, called for everyone to be treated equally. I would like to stress this point; everyone must be treated equally, and the law applies to everyone. I also welcome the fact that you do not wish to amend the Treaties and that there will be no change to the figures of 3% and 60%.
You spoke of flexibility, and indeed there are good economic reasons for flexibility. I would, however, like to make it quite clear that these reasons must be specified. In this instance flexibility appears to be a license for anyone with a few national peculiarities to ask to have these taken into account, and the Commission hands them what they want on a plate. The Commission must make improvements in this respect and elaborate on the relevant details.
What I find particularly regrettable is that even the Commission is not addressing the problems relating to the Pact, and you need to have a better procedure for dealing with them. If you tell governments that they must make savings and reduce debt when better times arrive, I do not believe that they will suddenly do so merely because the Commission tells them to, but because they want to make good on their election promises when the income situation improves. This, then, is where the Commission’s role must be strengthened vis-à-vis the Council on this issue. The members of the Group of the European People’s Party (Christian Democrats) in this House support you, and I hope that at least some of the finance ministers do too.
Let me conclude with one final comment; the Stability and Growth Pact should not be blamed already for the likely potential failure of the Lisbon Strategy, which is the fault of national governments. That would amount to myth making, which should not be allowed under any circumstances."@en1
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