Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-05-15-Speech-2-025"
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"en.20010515.2.2-025"2
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"Mr President, the von Wogau report understandably makes no mention of the Commission's criticism levelled at the UK's Labour Government. Chancellor Brown, no doubt with the general election of 7 June in mind, decided to promise considerable increases in public spending, particularly on health and education, threatening, without tax rises, to breach the stability and growth pact agreements and to raise the proportions spent by the public sector beyond the desirable current 38% level of GDP.
Mr Berlusconi's new government and promised economic package may also be problematic for the Commission, but it is particularly rich for the British Chancellor to reject this criticism from the Commission as interfering in sovereign British fiscal affairs, while at the same time making active plans for a referendum to join the euro, subject to his arbitrary five economic tests, which make no mention of the constitutional issues behind EMU, which are dear to British Conservatives.
Once the UK is in the euro zone, we will have even less fiscal autonomy, and I do not know what politically – as opposed to legally – binding guidelines really mean in practice, as we are forced to harmonise our taxes upwards to avoid so-called unfair tax competition and avoid distortion in Mr von Wogau's proposed European home market. That is a name that I, as a UK Member, object to, as it suggests that the three states remaining outside the euro, of which my country is one, are not at home in Europe's single market; so I would strongly suggest that euroland or euro zone is much the preferred label and I wish the zone every success for the future.
Although I personally have a problem with the term ‘social market economy’, as we in Britain associate it with social democracy, the description in the report rightly encapsulates the vision of a dynamic, deregulated, competitive, free-market economy that is sensitive to the needs of the environment and the labour markets, which I clearly welcome. However, I am not so sure whether the comments regarding the European Central Bank's first two years are exactly correct. It has not been a great success, and they are still muddling through and remain somewhat opaque in their decision-making process. This was clearly demonstrated by the quarter percent interest rate reduction last week which came across as panicky and a knee-jerk reaction to the downturn in the American economy and seemed to fly in the face of their own monetary and inflation targets as well as many speeches by Mr Duisenberg.
On another matter, I too call on the EU to implement rapidly the suggested liberalisation of the energy, post, airport and railway sectors. I personally also support the single sky initiative. Mr von Wogau was right: Europe will not become a fortress and overall, in spite of all the problems in the world, its prospects look relatively rosy in these uncertain times."@en1
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substitute; Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Consumer Policy (1999-07-21--2002-01-14)3
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