Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-10-21-Speech-1-050"
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"en.20021021.4.1-050"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner, the European Union has a single currency but it does not have a common economic policy. It has a single currency but it does not have a genuine economic policy authority. It has a single currency but it does not have a genuine federal budget.
Until yesterday, the Union had the Stability and Growth Pact: the wonderful substitute – yes, a substitute – for a non-existent economic policy, for a non-existent proper redistributive budget, for a non-existent economic policy authority, while even the single currency and the monetary area are far from perfect. As you know, President Prodi, the credibility of the euro is linked, amongst other things – above all, I would say – to the Stability and Growth Pact and to its capacity to force the Member States to produce responsible budgetary policies: budgetary policies, I would point out, which they themselves have proposed and which are accepted by all their citizens. Of course the Stability and Growth Pact is subject to constraints – that is clear and we are all aware of it – particularly at a time of recession such as that the Union is currently experiencing. Nevertheless, Mr Prodi, it is one thing to find an intelligent way round these constraints, but it is quite another to actually remove them, to change the rules half way through the game, leaving a free-for-all.
What concerns me, President Prodi, are not the intelligent changes – which are always welcome – but the danger that budgetary policy will actually be renationalised. This, President Prodi, is the most serious matter, the most perilous danger of all, for we could end up endorsing the policies of the irresponsible countries and penalising countries which have implemented responsible policies, the countries which have placed their trust in us. Rewarding the grasshoppers and punishing the ants will not help the euro: it will do nothing to further European integration at this very sensitive point in its development.
This is why the European People’s Party will, through its members taking part in the Convention, acting in accordance with the mandate they received at the recent Estoril Congress, propose that the Convention should constitutionalise the basic principles of the Stability and Growth Pact.
I am sure you will agree with me. And please, beware of fair-weather friends who arrive by your side at the eleventh hour!"@en1
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