Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2011-10-27-Speech-4-103-000"
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"en.20111027.6.4-103-000"2
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Mr President, honourable members, after a sleepless night, I would prefer to use my own language because this will enable me to express myself with more accuracy. I am pleased to have heard so many positive things today. I have to get used to it. I cherish this moment. I think that it happens too rarely to let it pass without comment.
If you read the texts properly, you will see that they do not just deal with the three points which happened to be included in my speech or my introduction. There are pages and pages about institutional reforms. We also go even further. I am also personally willing to exchange ideas with Parliament about deeper integration of the EU (that appears in the texts) and a further strengthening of fiscal discipline (that too), and to do this in good time so as not to surprise anybody. I am not obliged to do this, but if you are willing, I will be very happy to do so.
I will not go into all the other points because I have already taken up a lot of time, but I would like to say that we are not seeing the end of the crisis at this juncture. Perhaps we have achieved a turning point. It still has to be worked out what we can do at the level of the institutions, what we can do together, but the major work still remains to be done at Member State level. Reforms need to be implemented in many countries, including some which are not at present under pressure from the market. We have now created the institution to follow this up, to monitor it and, if necessary, to force it to happen. If there is no stability at Member State level, the whole structure will not work. This is the difficult task that we will face in the coming months and years.
In any case, if someone uses the expression ‘too little, too late’, they must also indicate what they are referring to: of what is there ‘too little’, and with what is one ‘too late’? If the markets are your reference point, you must choose your argument. You cannot say that we should not listen to the markets because they are based on speculative movements which are negative and biased, and then, at the same time, blame us for not being able to keep up with the rhythm and speed of the markets. It is one or the other. In any case, political decision-making will always be behind the markets. This is why it is all the more important – as some have said here – to show direction, to follow a course and, even if one might give the impression of acting slowly, to always move consistently in the same direction. I am happy to admit that we have not always managed that.
In analysing the crisis, we must be accurate. There are problems with decision-making at EU level, at the collective level, but there are also many problems at Member State level. The crisis began in Greece and then spread in the autumn to Ireland and then on to Portugal. These countries hesitated for a long while before calling in the Emergency Fund, and an appalling amount of time was wasted. The consequence of this is that we have sometimes acted after the event. Now there are some countries that should have taken measures earlier and failed to do so, but that, under pressure, including from their partners, were persuaded a few months ago to introduce important reforms. The crisis is therefore not just a crisis at the level of decision-making by the institutions – if it ever was – but is primarily a crisis at the level of individual Member States. This is all too easily forgotten and disregarded.
A second comment that has just been made is that we ‘have only taken decisions of principle’. I have to say that that is how it always is. Decisions that are taken are often decisions of principle. They are then put into effect. Mr Bisky has just quoted Goethe, so I will quote Racine:
‘The drama is complete, it is just the verse that remains to be written.’
We have therefore taken very important decisions effectively in all those areas. As far as the banks are concerned, I have a written agreement from the banks and not just something plucked from thin air. Of course, we do need to develop what has been decided in legal and financial terms, but the breakthrough has been made, the drama has been written. In any case, therefore, we made a lot more progress than was expected. Various models exist for what is known as leveraging – making the most of the possibilities offered by the Emergency Fund. These models do need to be sketched out, of course, but no further decisions are necessary. They can easily be combined and their effects cumulated. It is therefore not the case that we do not know where we are going. We just have to push things forward and further develop contacts with the private sector.
On the question of recapitalisation, of course there is time until 30 June of next year. It is not as if we could just find EUR 100 billion from one day to the next and pump it into the banks! All these things take time, but not as much time as is often suggested, and many of these decisions have already been taken in principle, and indeed more than in principle.
I will not go into all of the answers given by the President of the Commission; I am merely concerned with the institutional side of things. He did indeed speak about the European Parliament. Just look at the texts. I contributed to them myself. I am willing – even though I am not obliged – to come to Parliament after each individual eurozone meeting I chair and report on the meeting as with the European Council."@en1
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