Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2010-05-19-Speech-3-348"
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"en.20100519.22.3-348"2
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"Mr President, there are five plus two questions put forward concerning economic governance and Europe 2020. I will do my best to answer in five minutes, and in order to do that, I will use English as opposed to my native language.
During the last week of April and the first week of May, the Commission and the Presidency held a round of bilateral discussions to exchange initial ideas on potential national targets for the strategy. These discussions were very fruitful and allowed us to gain a first idea of where Member States stand and to understand the very peculiar economic circumstances that are a feature of each Member State. The bilateral meetings showed that most Member States strongly supported the headline targets and were ready to set ambitious national targets to meet the headline targets set by the Spring Council. Basing itself on the overall outcome of these meetings, the Commission will compile the results, which will then serve as an input for the various Council configurations in May and June. If there are discrepancies between the EU target and the sum of the national targets, we intend to continue the discussion with the Member States to see how national or EU-level action could bring the EU closer to the targets. The European Council has said that it will review the headline target in June on the basis of further work.
There is particular interest in an explanation on the poverty target, if you will allow me. The Spring Council asked the Commission to help the Member States to identify suitable indicators underpinning the EU headline target for social inclusion, in particular, through poverty reduction. After hearing the concerns of the various Member States, the Commission has presented a possible compromise proposal. The proposal is based on three main EU poverty indicators, namely: at risk of poverty; material deprivation; and the number of jobless households. Together, they reflect the multifaceted nature of poverty and the range of situations in the Member States. While a number of delegations have expressed support for the Commission proposal within the Social Protection Committee, some insist on including a labour market dimension in the EU target set. The Commission is actively exploring the possible solutions.
On governance, I wish to reassure you that we set great store by your role in the new strategy and by your input. President Barroso has made it clear that involving Parliament more closely in Europe 2020 is one of his main concerns for his second term. We are doing our best to make sure that Parliament has enough time to come to an opinion this year. I am personally fully committed to helping you in the process in every possible way. We need to have all the main EU institutions on board if the political ownership needed is to be there and the strategy is to succeed.
Concerning education and training, which is the subject of the second question on Europe 2020, I would just like to say the following. As early as the crisis recovery plan of November 2008, the Commission called on Member States to retain investment in education and training, and we will maintain this focus. In general, Member States have responded positively to the call to target the recovery measures at smart investment in resources of future growth. Many governments have neither reduced student support nor scaled back enrolment. On the contrary, many recovery packages have included measures to support wider participation in education, particularly in higher education. In spite of the crisis, education budgets announced for 2010 have remained constant or increased in many Member States. However, we do see signs of planned decreases in the education budgets of other countries.
We should bear in mind that some governments had already planned – and in some cases executed – general cuts in public budgets before the onset of the crisis. Many such cuts would affect education. Other Member States are exploring ways to diversify the sources of funding. The Commission will continue to watch this issue carefully. In some countries, financial constraints will only appear now. We will monitor general state budgets as well as the efficiency of investment.
At European level and within the existing multiannual financial framework, the Commission intends to prioritise action supporting the Europe 2020 objectives. Boosting economic recovery, investing in Europe’s youth and building tomorrow’s infrastructure are the priorities of the 2011 draft budget that the Commission recently adopted. Support for the ‘Youth on the Move’ flagship initiative means strengthening the ‘lifelong learning’ and ‘youth in action’ programmes as well as the ‘Marie Curie’ and ‘Erasmus for Entrepreneurs’ actions.
Let us not forget that we also intervene in this area through the Structural Funds. The European Social Fund, with a budget of EUR 76 billion over the 2007-2013 period, helps young people move from education to the world of work. It also helps people to return to education to renew and expand their skills. Around one third of the beneficiaries of the European Social Fund are young people. The Fund also allocates EUR 8.3 billion, which represents roughly 11% of its overall budget, to the reform of Member States’ education and training systems.
All of this demonstrates that the Europe 2020 strategy reinforces the concept of the knowledge-based economy and that education and training are at the heart of this. We will make sure that we have the resources to reach our targets.
Honourable Members, the first question is on how the Commission intends to strengthen the monitoring of the broad economic policy guidelines and how the Commission intends to ensure an active role of the national parliaments and the European Parliament in the multilateral surveillance process.
In reply to this first question, I would like to refer to the Commission communication on Europe 2020, in which the Commission proposes that the European Parliament should play an important role, not only in its capacity as a colegislator, but also as a driving force for mobilising citizens and the national parliaments. The Commission also emphasises the importance of establishing a permanent dialogue between various levels of government, including national, regional and local authorities and national parliaments, as well as social partners and representatives of civil society.
The second question concerns the Stability and Growth Pact and the additional instruments the Commission may foresee to complement this pact. Here, I would like to refer to our communication on reinforcing economic policy coordination, which we adopted last week. In this communication the Commission set out proposals on reinforcing compliance with the Stability and Growth Pact and deeper fiscal policy coordination. Specifically, the Commission intends to make budgetary surveillance and policy coordination more forward-looking. In the euro area in particular, a more far-reaching approach to the assessment of budgetary policies seems justified, including a more pervasive review of the weaknesses of national budgetary plans ahead of their adoption. Furthermore, in order to provide the right incentives for Member States to tackle fiscal imbalances, the functioning of the excessive deficit procedure could be improved by speeding up the individual procedures, in particular, with regard to Member States in repeated breach of the pact. The Commission also proposes to reinforce the macro-economic prevention framework for euro area Member States by establishing a permanent crisis resolution framework. Under the proposed mechanism, the EU would be able to issue debt to finance emergency loans to a euro area member in distress.
The third question concerns the differences between two Commission papers: on the one hand, the communication on public finances in the EMU 2006 of June 2006 and, on the other hand, the 2008 EMU 10 report. The policy recommendations that we made in 2006 focused on the changes brought about by the reform of the Pact in 2005. The 2008 EMU 10 report is consistent with what was written at the time, for instance, on the relevance of long-term sustainability, on the need to set incentives in good times and on the positive role of national fiscal frameworks. At the same time, the lessons of more than 10 years of EMU and the recent impact of the crisis call for an updated but still consistent assessment. Last week’s communication on reinforcing economic policy coordination focuses on making the pact more rigorous with regard to both its preventive and corrective arm. It also makes detailed proposals against the background of the new opportunities provided by the Lisbon Treaty.
We propose reinforcing the Stability and Growth Pact framework, both in its preventive and corrective dimensions; broadening the surveillance of macro-economic imbalances and competitiveness trends within the euro area; introducing a ‘European semester’ to strengthen ex ante integrated economic policy coordination; and, finally, working towards a robust and permanent crisis resolution mechanism for euro area Member States in fiscal distress.
The fourth question refers to the task force established by the European Council in March 2010 in order to improve economic governance in the Union. The Commission will cooperate constructively in the interest of the Union and in full respect of its right of initiative. Last week’s communication already constitutes a significant contribution to the task force. The European Parliament, in this context, is obviously a very important stakeholder in the EU economic governance reform. Through its work and reports in the relevant committees – economic crisis committees in particular – Parliament is already providing valuable contributions to the deliberations of the task force.
The fifth and final question is about the trust that needs to be rebuilt in European banks and financial markets and in the European project in general. I will just sum this up very quickly, because it is a broad subject. I think there are three important issues to be underlined here: first, the importance of financial regulation to create a much safer financial system; second, to make the fiscal stability rules very clear, transparent and understandable for all; and, third, to restore the growth potential of Europe. That is why Europe 2020 plays an important role in this context as well. So these elements, in my view, are equally important in restoring trust in the European project.
This leads me to the two questions on the Europe 2020 strategy. In line with the conclusions of the Spring European Council, in particular, as regards the headline targets for the Europe 2020 strategy, the Commission has started working with the Member States on setting national targets to underpin the headline targets. To facilitate this work, the Employment Committee Indicators Group has produced two alternative technical approaches that show what each Member State would need to do to ensure the EU meets the 75% target in terms of employment levels."@en1
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