Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-04-25-Speech-3-427"
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"en.20070425.40.3-427"2
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"Mr President, Mr Lauk’s report is an accurate description of the current situation, and is undoubtedly a lesson for the countries that have not yet joined the EMU. Mr Lauk rightly underlined the main threats to the European Union, which are persistently high budget deficits and uncontrolled growth in budgetary expenditure because of the ageing populations in the EU. It also says that increasing growth rates will make it possible to avoid disaster. However, the report fails to answer the fundamental question of how this growth is to be achieved when the economies of the Member States are less competitive than world leaders, and there is no active policy to encourage families in any EU country. Mr Lauk’s report clearly shows that the EMU, which is in effect a private members’ club for the EU, lacks any prescription as to how the impending threat could be avoided. I have given two examples of how to avoid the main challenge facing the EU countries. In EU debates, for example, delocalisation is not regarded as an opportunity, but a threat to jobs in countries where production costs are higher than in countries where they are lower. These debates very frequently mention the ‘demographic challenges’, as if nobody realises that they are the result of a dramatic fall in the birth rate. A great deal is said about avoiding pregnancy, the right to abortion, and numerous debates have been held on homophobia – today we have just had the third such debate in two years. But what I would like to know is where is the debate on an active policy of encouraging childbirth in the EU? Only by increasing the birth rate can we avoid the deterioration of the mysterious ‘demographic challenge’. The representatives of the Member States may debate on the maturity or otherwise of other countries, but for the countries that have adopted the euro, this is undoubtedly an important lesson."@en1
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