Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-07-03-Speech-4-005"
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"en.20030703.1.4-005"2
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".
Many thanks, Mr President. Mr President of the European Central Bank, ladies and gentlemen. Mr Duisenberg, I have been reading your biography in recent weeks and have found it very enjoyable and interesting. The book begins with a beautifully written preface describing the tough negotiations that preceded your appointment as the first President of the Central Bank. They were difficult negotiations that were to lay the foundations of a stringent policy aimed at stabilising the euro. If one thing became clear, however, it was that you set your very own course for the European Central Bank, in which political views did not play a role. It is an ironic twist of fate, then, that the very country that found it hard to accept your nomination for longer than four years, asked a few months ago whether you would like to stay on a little longer.
Mr Duisenberg, your last annual report has come out in a period in which the growth of the European economy has stagnated. The last quarter saw zero growth. Some Member States are thus officially in recession, and that means that the economy has contracted for the second consecutive quarter. This puts the European Union in a worrying situation. The measures taken by the Union and the Member States have thus proved unable to turn the economic tide in the short term, and it is in this very period that we are discussing the fifth annual report of the European Central Bank. It is an annual report about a very eventful year; a year in which citizens had their first chance to show their confidence in the euro; and a year which was preceded by higher expectations as regards economic recovery following the September 11 attacks. Many of those expectations were not realised. New threats slowed down the pace of recovery, and the euro is yet to inspire great confidence in citizens. The fact that 300 million inhabitants of the euro zone are making full use of the new currency does not prove anything except that they have no real alternative: they have to use it, and no further political conclusions can be drawn from this.
In a climate of uncertainty such as this, it is not surprising that the ECB has its work cut out if it is to fulfil the objective of stability. It is not only the responsibility of the ECB, however, but also of the Member States; after all, it is their budgetary policy that lays the foundations for a stable euro. I should like to devote attention to a few further points in this debate.
First of all, it is important that we make our position known succinctly in the form of a resolution. Now is not the time to reveal all of our political desires for change. The most important thing, in this economically less prosperous time, is that Parliament make clear that it supports a policy that has stability as its aim. Stability of the currency, and hopefully a return to economic growth in the short term, are necessary in order to restore the confidence of manufacturers and consumers and revive the economy. The number of new political desires contained in the resolution is therefore limited.
In addition, it would be ill-advised to start tampering with the ECB's objectives already. The resolution emphasises – incidentally following on from earlier resolutions – that price stability is, and must remain, the chief objective of the ECB. New objectives, such as the promotion of economic growth and other tasks, are subordinate to this. An important argument for this relates to the short history of the Bank. To date, the Bank has not been confronted with a Europe-wide recession; it has, however, met with repeated criticism of its policy. For example, in times of economic prosperity, there was a great deal of criticism when the exchange rate of the euro depreciated, and also now, when it is rising – even though the exchange rate of the euro against the dollar is not an aim in itself. What is important is monetary stability within the euro zone itself, and this is the ECB's responsibility.
In brief, a real acid test is yet to come. The Bank has yet to prove its ability to fulfil the objective of price stability in times of recession, too, using the existing instruments. In addition to this, inflation has been relatively high up to now, and real wages are increasing sharply despite the increase in unemployment, which indicates continuing structural rigidities in the labour markets. I should like to emphasise that it is important for precisely that price stability – to which consumer confidence is inextricably linked – that the ECB be allowed to continue to do its work independently of politics. Parliament therefore bears some of the responsibility for creating the political preconditions for this by means of a resolution.
Finally, Mr Duisenberg, on the back cover of your biography there is a photograph of you evidently enjoying your hobby, fishing. I wish you a good catch, and I also wish you good health and enjoyment of the finer things in life in the years to come."@en1
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