Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2009-03-24-Speech-2-013"
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"en.20090324.3.2-013"2
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".
After several postponements, we have finally reached a big day. I wish to express my gratitude that the Commission addressed the topic of micro-credit in a separate report back in November 2007, although it is also true that Parliament had already requested that summer that we work on this subject. I also approve of the fact that this debate is being coordinated by the member of the Commission responsible for cohesion, for as we know, previously it was mooted that the Commissioner for financial affairs should coordinate it; but the goal is that Community tools should truly reflect the perspectives of cohesion.
I regret, however, that the Commission’s materials did not extend to legislative tasks or include legislative proposals; therefore, the report of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs invoked the strongest possible measure, namely Article 39, and asked that concrete legal measures or organisational and financial steps be taken by the Commission in five different areas.
I would like to take this opportunity to express my gratitude to my shadow rapporteur, Mrs De Vits, to my colleague, Mrs Baeva, and to Mrs Ambruster of the Secretariat, for their enthusiastic work.
Why is micro-credit important? On the one hand, we would like to include in the national Lisbon action programmes the obligation of Member States to report regularly on their progress in this area. Only that which is obligatory yields results.
On the other hand, and this is the greatest merit of the Commissioner’s approach, we wish to include new social segments in the sphere of economic activities. To this end, we need to launch a form of credit that helps persons with modest skills, who lack the collateral or real estate coverage required for traditional small business credit, to enter the labour market. Involving these new segments in the labour market will be indispensable for sustainable development and for attaining the 70% legal employment rate.
But how should we approach these layers of society? On the one hand, as my report also mentions, we need to move beyond the tendency to look at those in difficulty as a single group. We need to define disadvantaged groups more precisely: these include migrants in western countries, Roma in eastern areas, people living in rural areas or encampments and, generally speaking, women.
Yet these people cannot be reached in the tried and true manner, directly through the traditional networks of commercial banks, because these target groups are suspicious of the above instruments, and as already mentioned, they are not able to enter the free market. Therefore, inspired by the Asian example transposed to Europe, loans need to be made in small circles, having gained their confidence, basing the credit more on trust than on collateral. The intermediary organisation plays an important role in this system, of course, and this organisation must be able to carry on these activities even if it does not have a banking licence. We have succeeded in achieving this in certain Member States, but it is not yet the case everywhere, and therefore we need to involve non-bank organisations, including financial institutions that are close to the population and outside the securitisation market.
The question of an interest-rate cap has come up, and it is our opinion that although credit is expensive, the most important consideration is nonetheless a steady stream of liquidity for those using the system. For this reason I do not support introducing an interest-rate cap. Here we need to distinguish between consumer credit and micro-credit, for the two should not be confused.
It is important, moreover, to create incentives at national level, so that people should want to become micro-entrepreneurs with the help of micro-credit rather than collecting unemployment benefit. We need to show solidarity in the struggle against terrorism and the fight against money-laundering as well, for it is precisely by means of a mentorship system that we can somehow overcome the problems of a lack of permanent address or of a bank account, and the lack of start-up capital."@en1
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