Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2006-10-26-Speech-4-022"
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"en.20061026.3.4-022"2
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"Mr President, I would like to express a favourable opinion of the activities of the European Central Bank in 2005. I would also like to categorically state that the Socialist Group in the European Parliament fully supports and respects the independence of the Central Bank. We believe that this independence is a
for conducting an appropriate monetary policy within the economic and monetary union. It also guarantees the value of our common currency.
I would now like to highlight three issues that have long been debated in this House. Firstly, the relative importance of the two pillars of monetary policy adopted by the ECB remains unclear. I refer here to monetary supply as opposed to other information on future inflation. As a result, we do not know whether, or to what extent, developments in monetary supply constitute a decisive factor for the ECB when setting interest rates. Laying down clear rules in this matter would improve the transparency and effectiveness of monetary policy.
Secondly, a clear interpretation of the ECB's mandate, as laid down in Article 105(1) of the Treaty, is urgently required. In particular, the ECB needs to state how it intends to fulfil its Treaty obligations to support the European Union’s economic policy while simultaneously maintaining price stability, and what resources it intends to draw upon to do so. I would point out that the Treaty draws a clear distinction between these two aims, and that they cannot therefore be deemed to be interchangeable. If the ECB adopted a clear stance on this question, it would be possible to avoid misunderstandings as to whether or not the ECB is responsible for attaining aims other than price stability.
Thirdly, the ECB is mistaken in its interpretation of the inflation criterion applied in assessing how prepared new Member States are for entry into the euro zone. The Treaty clearly states that the point of reference should be the average inflation rate of, and I quote
‘the three best performing Member States in terms of price stability’. The Treaty makes no mention of the lowest prices. The ECB defined price stability as a rate of inflation under 2% but close to 2%. However, when assessing the degree of preparedness of the candidate countries, the ECB applies another definition, namely the average of the three countries with the lowest inflation. There cannot be two different definitions of the same Treaty provision, and I therefore call on the ECB to clarify the situation."@en1
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