Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2004-07-21-Speech-3-072"
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"en.20040721.4.3-072"2
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"Mr President-in-Office of the Council, your Presidency will have to prepare the mid-term review of the Lisbon Strategy. The least that one can say is that the European Union is a long way from achieving its objective of becoming, by the year 2010, the most competitive knowledge-based economy in the world.
On the contrary, throughout Europe there is growing concern about businesses relocating, about workers being blackmailed into accepting longer working hours, and about continuing unemployment. The recovery is all the more fragile for not being based either on internal demand or on sustained public investment; instead, it remains exposed to the impact of external factors such as the rise in the value of the euro and the increase in the price of oil.
More than ever, Europe needs a strategy for sustainable growth and employment, and for investment in research, in major trans-European networks, in education, in knowledge and in the environment. It needs economic and social cohesion. It needs the Lisbon Strategy. Yet certain people are trying to use the present economic slow-down as a pretext to return to an ultra-liberal programme, and to destroy the achievements of Lisbon and the integration of the various economic, social and environmental dimensions into the policies of the Union.
In that respect, your Presidency’s priorities cause us great concern. You say that you support the Lisbon Agenda, and we have heard you say so. Yet your priorities – and here again we have read what you have written and we have heard what you have said – show that your approach is very unilateral and does not take into consideration the coherence of the Lisbon Agenda, which comprises the liberalisation of the market, in particular in the services sector, deregulation, and the reduction of administrative costs.
As for the financial perspectives – another major area for action during your Presidency – you want to restrict the Union’s budget to 1% of GDP. Yet such an initiative is incompatible not only with the efforts which have to made in research, and on the subject of which Romano Prodi has put forward some proposals, but also with the policy of territorial cohesion in the new enlarged EU. You reject any revision of the pact to take more account of economic cycles and, in particular, public-investment requirements. As far as you are concerned, public-investment policies, employment regulations and environmental regulations are really no more than obstacles, unnecessary burdens and restrictions on growth.
We, on the other hand, believe that all these things make the EU more competitive, and we also believe that respect for the integrity of the Lisbon Agenda will be a test of your Presidency’s success and will determine what support we shall be able to give it."@en1
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