Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2009-01-13-Speech-2-038"
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"en.20090113.5.2-038"2
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"Mr President, Mr Giscard d’Estaing, Mr Juncker, Mr Trichet, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I would like to remind you how, in 1992, when it was still completely dubious as to whether the French would vote in favour of the Maastricht Treaty, Jacques Delors spoke to the general assembly of the French Green Party, which managed to deliver the missing 1% or 2%.
Lastly, as has already been mentioned, there needs to be supervision at a European level and the European Central Bank is in the best position to perform this function.
He said to us: ‘Vote for the euro, then we will have a political Europe, because if we do not create a political Europe to control Europe, the people will not accept it; they will never accept it.’ He did not persuade us. The Maastricht Treaty was approved, but no political Europe was created. This is the very problem which we are facing today.
Why were we against the euro at that time? There were basically two reasons for it. Firstly, it seemed to us that the Maastricht criteria were going to drag Europe into at least five years of pro-cyclical recessionary policy and, secondly, the way in which the monetary policy was incorporated into the general economic policy by the Maastricht Treaty was not satisfactory. For the sake of the European Central Bank’s independence, we would separate monetary policy from the rest of the policies.
I must say quite honestly that, even if I am still not convinced by the Maastricht Treaty today, like all the other Greens, I am rather attracted by the changes which the legislation and application of Economic and Monetary Union have undergone.
Three major changes have taken place. Firstly, price stability has been established at a level of slightly less than, but close to, 2%. This target may seem a bit absurd. At the moment, when the world is being threatened by deflation and the situation is being aggravated by the tendency of some countries to hastily cut their VAT rate as part of a Keynesian policy, it is obvious that setting this target of 2% is no longer just for show. If we fail to keep to this 2% target we run the risk of having very high real interest rates being forced on us.
The second major reform is obviously the reform of the Stability and Growth Pact carried out in 2005, which allows us today to have a policy that is contracyclical and aimed at countering the crisis.
The third major transformation is the change to how things work in practice. This permanent dialogue, as highlighted once again in this Chamber, between Mr Trichet, Mr Almunia, Mr Juncker and Mr Barroso, is, strictly speaking, contrary to the Maastricht Treaty itself. I regard this form of cooperation between Mr Trichet and Mr Almunia, for example, to be the equivalent of that between Mr Bernanke and Mr Paulson, which is a positive and desirable development. What remains to be done then? All I would say is that we need to apply properly the good aspects of the Maastricht Treaty.
We have a real problem in defining the exchange rate, which has been mentioned on several occasions by my predecessors. The task of setting the exchange rate is assigned to the Council. We must find the means to ensure that the Council sets an exchange rate for Europe which does not derive randomly from the interest rate chosen by the European Central Bank, but properly reflects an industrial policy. We must find the proper instruments to do this.
Secondly, the European Central Bank’s objective is not only to maintain a rate close to 2% but also to apply Europe’s policy, by that I mean the Lisbon and Gothenburg Strategies. We need to have a policy for refinancing and rediscounting private debts by the European Central Bank according to the Gothenburg and Lisbon Strategies."@en1
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