Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-01-16-Speech-3-054"
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"en.20020116.6.3-054"2
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Mr President, Prime Minister, ladies and gentlemen, this past New Year’s Eve, all of Europe celebrated the launch of the euro with great joy. Barely two weeks have gone by since then, but those two weeks have been enough to see us complete almost the entire transition to the new notes and coins. In the twelve Euro-zone countries, 90% of payments are now being made in the single currency: the changeover to the euro has been both a huge task and a huge success. We can all feel proud of that success because we have all contributed to it: the European Parliament and national parliaments, governments, the European Central Bank and the Member States’ central banks, the Commission, commercial banks, post offices, retailers, businesses, the media and every one of our citizens who have helped to bring about this historic changeover.
The Commission’s report looks at the progress made so far in implementing the Lisbon strategy and concludes that all the prerequisites for success are there. On the macroeconomic front, the efforts made over the last ten years towards introducing the euro have enabled the Union to achieve economic stability and have protected it from the worst of the international economic and financial crises. Even at this time of economic slowdown, the bases of Europe’s economy have remained sound.
Encouraging progress has also been made in implementing the strategy adopted at Lisbon. Significant results have been achieved in a number of areas such as the environment, telecommunications, education, pension reform and research, but progress has not been as good in other areas, with Commission proposals stalled and the deadlines set by the European Council itself in jeopardy. Among these areas are some that are essential to the integration of financial, transport and energy services, the Community patent and the Galileo project. I am pleased to see, Mr President, that you have made these areas a priority for your action in the coming months. We need to catch up, and catch up fast. Our credibility and, more importantly, our chances of making real progress depend on it. If there is no change, we will end up with less growth and less jobs.
The Commission report sets three priorities for 2002: employment, reform and knowledge. First, employment.
Europe needs an active employment policy. More needs to be done to remove the obstacles that still prevent people from finding employment or which make it difficult for them to keep their jobs. Member States must cut the cost of labour by reducing taxation that affects wages and salaries – especially low wages. They must also review those aspects of their unemployment benefit systems that dissuade people from returning to the labour market and they must make it less easy for them to take early retirement. We need better childcare, in order to improve women’s presence in the workforce. We need incentives for those who decide to stay in work longer. Employment rates can also be maintained by improving skills, education and individuals’ mobility within Europe and between production sectors. In other words, we need an active, not a passive approach to change.
Second, reform, and completing the internal market.
We need to connect Europe and its markets. Much greater effort must be made to achieve an interconnection of national markets and to speed up the integration of financial markets, concluding the reforms already underway. We need to open up and connect the energy and transport markets and develop Europe’s broadband networks. These industries are the backbone of our economy. We need greater competition to bring prices down and stimulate growth while maintaining a sufficient standard of basic services for everyone.
Third, education, training and research.
Education, training and research really are the keys to economic renewal, sustainable growth and job creation. There can be no ‘knowledge-based society’ without knowledge. Therefore, we need to invest much more heavily in these areas. We need an integrated strategy for Community-level education and research, based on networking and mobility and giving priority to the technologies of the future, to biotechnology and clean technologies, for example.
Finally, our report states the need, after Barcelona, to introduce measures to strengthen coordination of our overall economic strategy. This means building a consensus on principles and rules of economic policy that take account of economic interdependence within the euro zone.
Accordingly, we need to synchronise the three current processes – the broad economic policy guidelines, the employment guidelines and the process of economic reform launched at Cardiff – so that, each year, the Spring Council can review economic and social policy as a whole and make sure it is sustainable. Only a more coherent approach will enable us to make full, effective use of the various instruments at our disposal. It is time to give up the old, sectorally-fragmented methods.
Prime Minister, the President of the Commission has to play a sometimes rather uncomfortable role at European Councils – that of being the one who reminds those he is working with of the need to honour undertakings made collectively. However, I remain confident that you will support me at Barcelona when I urge the Member States to push ahead resolutely with the agenda of reforms agreed at Lisbon, in line with the report’s recommendations. We are responsible for making sure that the Barcelona Council achieves total success. If the process grinds to a halt, the cost of ‘non-reform’ would become unbearable both in economic terms and in terms of the Union’s political credibility.
Ladies and gentlemen, 2002 will be a crucial year for the enlargement process, and we know that – as we have heard – the Spanish Presidency will be making every effort to keep up the momentum, so that we can conclude negotiations this year with those countries that have shown that they meet the criteria for accession.
Vital though it is to the Union’s future, eastward enlargement is not the only external issue requiring the Union’s attention. Relations with the countries of the Mediterranean are, of necessity, a priority for the Union in its external activities. I look forward to seeing Euro-Mediterranean dialogue move decisively forwards under the Spanish Presidency – after all, it was in Barcelona that the dialogue was launched. To this end, we must adopt a more flexible approach, setting up, together with some groups of countries on the southern shores of the Mediterranean, new forms of sub-regional cooperation.
For millions of European citizens, the euro notes and coins in their pockets are a tangible sign of the great political project of building a united Europe. As a symbol of that unity, the euro is having an even greater psychological impact than the abolition of passport controls at Europe’s internal borders. The euro is thus becoming a key element in people’s sense of a shared European identity and a common destiny, just as it is tangible evidence that European integration is now irreversible.
Secondly, we have to put into practice the idea, formed jointly by the Presidency of the Council and the Commission, of a 'Mediterranean Development Bank’. Irrespective of whether it is an independent bank or part of the European Investment Bank, it is to be a forum dedicated to development, in which European and Southern Mediterranean operators work side by side.
In addition, it is vital to promote mutual understanding and knowledge between peoples and cultures, through specific actions on various fronts. Indeed, I feel that it is precisely by exporting our experience of peacemaking and our commitment to promoting democracy that we will be able to take “More Europe” to the rest of the world.
Prime Minister, you have pointed out that Latin America, though very distant from us geographically, is very close to Europe’s culture and origins, having shared a long period of history with many European countries. This is a time when the Union must show particularly strong solidarity with Argentina and all of Mercosur, as they experience serious crisis.
Argentina needs to return to the path of economic growth, the only way for it to improve its present difficult social situation. There is only one recipe for achieving this goal: restoring confidence. Confidence in political institutions, confidence in the stability of the rule of law and confidence in a credible, coherent economic programme. Our experience of financial reform and economic development driven by trade and integration could be of valuable help to Latin America as it endeavours to recover, with advantages for all involved.
Mr President, Prime Minister, ladies and gentlemen, I would now like to finish by saying a few words on the Convention that will be beginning its work under the Spanish Presidency.
The Convention’s great significance will give it the chance to write an exciting chapter in Europe’s history. We all have a duty to do all we can to ensure that this does indeed happen. I have already assured its Chairman, Mr Giscard d’Estaing, that he will have the full support of the Commission and the Commission’s representatives to the Convention. The Commission expects to work just as closely with the European Parliament, as the legitimate representative of the hopes of the people of Europe. We must ensure that the debate is full and fruitful and, most importantly, that it delivers a vision for the future with which the majority of our citizens can identify. The Convention and the subsequent Intergovernmental Conference must complete the construction of an open, accountable, democratic and fair Europe.
The changeover to the euro shows that the Europeans are willing to embrace change enthusiastically and resolutely if that change is for the sake of a better future, and if all the issues involved are discussed thoroughly and openly. The changeover to the euro shows the scale of what Europe can achieve when it can muster the necessary political will. We must take this as a valuable lesson and apply it in the preparations for all the stages in the process of integration.
Mr President, Prime Minister, Spain has chosen the motto “More Europe” for its six-month presidency of the Union. I think we can say, just after the launch of the euro, that Spain could not have chosen better.
Prime Minister, your government has also devised a broad but balanced and ambitious programme, and I am very pleased to see that the priorities it sets out match the priorities that the Commission has set itself for 2002. I can therefore assure you that you can count on the Commission’s full support.
Mr President, Prime Minister, ladies and gentlemen, the same ambition that has led to the success of the launch of the new European currency must now be shown and exploited again to accomplish the Union’s Economic and Social Agenda. We have achieved monetary union. The time has now come to focus on economic union, and to make it a tangible reality. We need the economic growth that will generate jobs and a better quality of life.
Almost two years have passed since the European Council in Lisbon set the goal of making the Union the world’s most dynamic and competitive knowledge-based economic area by the end of this decade, an area which would also enjoy full employment and increased economic and social cohesion. Since that time, the Spring Councils have provided the opportunity to discuss economic, social and environmental issues as part of a wide-ranging strategy for sustainable development. The Barcelona Council will, therefore, be called upon to assess the progress we have made so far and to set priorities for the coming years. In preparation for the Council, yesterday, the Commission adopted its Spring Report, which will provide the basis for the Council’s work and which, this year, bears the title ‘The Lisbon strategy — making change happen’.
Yesterday’s Commission communication has a central message: the time has come to stick to our commitments and to speed up reform. We have no choice: the strategy adopted at Lisbon is the key to developing and consolidating our European economic and social model. Indeed, we are reforming a society that already has its own shared values, values that distinguish Europe from the rest of the world and on which the European Union is founded. It is precisely these values that we have in mind when we speak of the ‘European social model’.
On this basis, we have to continue to update the kind of model of society we want and can achieve in Europe: the kind of free, fair, democratic society that our fellow-citizens hold so dear. This is not about devaluing or getting rid of our social heritage: it is about adapting it and modernising it so as to ensure that it lasts. We have a duty to history, a duty to protect future generations and a duty to respond to globalisation, and all the more so at this time of great uncertainty and risk when genuine, practical solidarity – not just superficial, partial solidarity – has become very important for our citizens, especially the weakest among them."@en1
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