Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-02-14-Speech-3-299"
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"en.20070214.22.3-299"2
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".
Mr President, first of all, I should like to congratulate and thank the rapporteur, who has considerably lightened the shadow rapporteurs’ load by submitting an excellent text that needed hardly any editing, and. with which, as it is now before us, I too am pleased, for it contains many excellent recommendations, although many of them we have, of course, made before, and what is lacking is action. Many of these things have not been implemented. It is true that the economy is picking up, but this is no time to rest on our laurels. Where, for example, the Stability and Growth Pact is concerned, now is the time when the preventive leg should enter into force. Rather than blowing the kitty, we should keep the budget in good shape, reduce debts, invest, and in that sense, I am completely at one with Mr Bullmann. This should not, however, take on the form that it often does, namely subsidies that distort the market and replace the desperately-needed reforms. This is often simply used as a fig leaf, which is not the idea.
I am all in favour of completing the internal market, and I hope that the Services Directive, which was far too weak for my liking, will have some impact on that front after all. A great deal needs to be done in the area of labour market measures too, and I would like to say, briefly, that I see the social model as one in which all Europeans are given opportunities, but the one we have at present is still systematically excluding 8% of the people from the labour market, and not only eastern European workers and immigrants. We would rather have them drown in the Mediterranean than give them access to our labour market. It is meanwhile the case that we have been turning a blind eye to the fact that people working illegally on our markets under the most abominable conditions are almost kept as slaves. This is not so much a social model as a disgrace for Europe, so as far as I am concerned, the free movement of eastern European workers could not come any sooner, complete with an immigration system and green card.
Finally, some question the merits of more coordination of national economic policy. We should have another discussion on this some time. I think it is, at any rate, far preferable than the current trend towards protectionism and Member States competing against one another, for the fact is that, if we in Europe want to be of any significance in the world economy, we have to ensure that we have a strong, open market, which means that we have to focus on areas of future significance, that is to say on energy, innovation and sustainable development – areas in which we should become world leaders."@en1
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