Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-03-12-Speech-3-026"
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"en.20080312.3.3-026"2
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"Mr President-in-Office, Mr President of the Commission, Mr President of Parliament, ladies and gentlemen, if we look at the agenda of the spring summit we find an almost complete list of the socio-economic and ecological challenges facing our generation: that is, if we want to take responsibility for those who come after us in a time of globalisation, climate change, technological advances and an ageing demographic.
Without doubt we are responsible for the objectives and the approaches necessary to achieve this, and of course we expect everyone to do what they have said they will do and that sufficient pressure will be exerted at all political levels to achieve results.
As group coordinator for the Lisbon Strategy I want to say how much we value the fact that the Commission has presented the Community Lisbon Programme. Each of the 10 points gets our full support, and the same goes for the announcement of the Small Business Act. This is on condition, however, that the Small Business Act pays more than just lip service to SMEs. This Act, Mr President, must therefore become more than the SME Charter, which was approved in Santa Maria da Feira some years ago. To do its job, the Small Business Act must ensure that the best possible operating environment is created for SMEs, and that applies to very small, small and medium-sized enterprises.
To this end, one condition is absolutely necessary and must apply at every stage, to substantive measures or mere simplification measures: think small first. Take the SME as the point of departure and not as an exception, and let us take this as a binding criterion so that it at last becomes more than just a slogan. It is only in this way that we will truly succeed in getting through to the firms that form the bulk of our business environment, but, more importantly, that provide the greatest number of jobs and the jobs that are currently being created.
It would be a very good thing, Members of the Commission and of the Council, if tomorrow at the spring Council this binding principle could be agreed upon once and for all. Thank you for your attention."@en1
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