Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-07-04-Speech-1-111"
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"en.20050704.17.1-111"2
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".
Mr President, in one of the first speeches, Mr Klinz said that the introduction of the euro has been a success, and I share that view, as Mr Klinz and this Parliament are well aware, but I also share the concern of those people who have said during the debate that we must continue to adopt clear decisions and guidelines to ensure that it continues to be a success, because it is important to us, both as citizens and as defenders of the project of European integration.
With regard to the conditions under which the euro was introduced, it is true that there was abuse, in some countries more than others, in terms of taking advantage of the change of currency to round up and increase certain prices. It is also the case that the countries that were more and better prepared were able to prevent practically all the kinds of abuse that took place in countries that did not sufficiently prepare their lead-up to the single currency through information campaigns, but also through negotiations with the sectors affected, through transparency by means of displaying both prices for a reasonable period of time prior to the actual introduction of coins and notes, and also through information during the days immediately following the entry into force of coins and notes.
It has been said that both the European Central Bank and the Commission have studied the general impact of the abuse on price indices, which did not exceed 0.2% - 0.3%, but the negative perception of many citizens remains. I agree with Mr Doyle’s view that now, several years after the introduction of coins and notes, the citizens who express scepticism about the euro do so much more because of the situation of the economy, the increase in unemployment, the inability to promote investments or generate employment, than because of their memory of abuses that took place a few years ago.
The issue of abuse must not be exaggerated. Today in the Danish press, the Danish Finance Minister, Mr Pedersen, says that in Denmark, a country that is not in the euro zone, the rises in the prices of certain services — bars, restaurants and certain services provided directly to citizens — during January and February 2002 were practically identical to the increases that took place in the countries that introduced the euro. So we must not exaggerate, but we must learn from experience, particularly in the case of the new Member States that aspire to integrate their currencies into the euro over the coming years, and that is what we are doing.
Naturally, the citizens’ opinion of the economic situation, their confidence in it and in political and economic leaders goes much further than simply whether or not there has been abuse in the rounding up of certain prices. We have to talk about this, as we have done in this debate and as we will continue to do in others, about the implementation of the necessary structural reforms that we have discussed and that we are discussing within the context of the revised Lisbon Strategy, we must continue to talk about how to apply the Stability and Growth Pact
and I referred earlier in my first speech to the Commission's commitment to apply the new Pact rigorously
and I would like to ask some of you, who have called into question the possibility of applying budgetary discipline rules in the future within the framework of the economic and monetary union now that the Pact has been reformed, to take account of the reality of its application. We have been discussing how the Pact should be reformed. That debate is now over. The two new regulations have entered into force and we are now applying the new Pact. And I would ask the honourable Members to give their opinion on how the rules are applied rather than how you would have liked the rules to be, because the credibility of the Stability and Growth Pact also depends
very much
on your opinion, and when some of your citizens or some politicians in the Member States hear some of you express the opinion that there are no longer any budgetary rules, they believe it, and I do not want certain Finance Ministers to believe that there are no budgetary rules."@en1
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