Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2012-02-01-Speech-3-023-000"
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"en.20120201.12.3-023-000"2
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"Mr President, the summit on Monday was about jobs and growth, but I must say that, in my opinion – and my assessment is the same as that of my colleague Joseph Daul – it has mainly produced words. Seven pages of words and seven pages of good intentions. I think what we need now in the middle of this crisis is not seven pages of words, but acts – acts of the European Union and acts of the European institutions.
Let me give you just three examples. The first is the European patent. It is a major instrument for growth in Europe, but, for more than a year now, its introduction – which is so needed – has been blocked. Why is it blocked? Because, for the moment, the big countries cannot agree on the seat: that is the reality in Europe for the moment. On the seat! This is completely ridiculous and I should say even tragic, because, in the mean time, our small and medium enterprises are paying eight times more for the protection of their innovations than their American counterparts do. So I ask the President of the Council and the President of the Commission: if Germany, Britain and France really cannot agree, why can the EU leadership not put the seat temporarily in Brussels? Why are they not doing that – as we did, Mr Cohn-Bendit, with the European Food Agency in 2001? I think it is a shame to have a Council summit about growth but not to be capable of definitely launching the European patent in Europe.
Let me give a second example of this, namely the project bonds. How many times have we already discussed the project bonds in this Parliament? We have been discussing them for years. My question is: why do we not start tomorrow with project bonds in the European Union? Why is it necessary to wait for two years of discussion inside the Council and inside other institutions?
Let me give a third example of this, namely the enormous amount of unused money in the structural and other European funds. We could change the regulation immediately. You know what the problem is – if you put in one euro from the structural funds, you also need one euro from the country in question, and these countries, for example Greece and Portugal, cannot do this at the moment. So why is it not possible immediately to change the regulation and immediately to use this unused, unspent money for countries in recession, such as Portugal and Greece? That is what we need today – acts and not words, not the seven pages we have seen up to now.
Finally, I think another problem we have today is the existential problem that we have in this euro crisis. We have now secured a new treaty. We now have fiscal discipline – let us be honest, a six-pack, a two-pack, a new treaty – but how will we now deal with the high interest rates we still have, even after the intervention of the European Central Bank, in countries such as Spain and Italy? Everybody here knows that an interest rate of around 6% is not sustainable for Italy. Whatever decision Mr Monti may take, it is not sustainable and Italy cannot recover with a 6% interest rate.
We have already put more than EUR 1 000 billion into the fight against this crisis – EUR 1 trillion of taxpayers’ money – and the end is not in sight. The reason for this is that we always take half measures. We need a structural solution to this crisis. In my opinion a structural solution means a mutualisation of a part of the debt in a disciplined way.
That is the proposal of the five wise German economists: to create a redemption fund. Let us be clear. My conclusion is a message to the German taxpayers. If the solution we opt for is a redemption fund, it will be the bond holders who receive lower interest rates: they are the solution to the crisis, and not the German taxpayers. So my message today to all of you is: let us take up that proposal of a redemption fund and let us in our legislative work bring it about as fast as possible."@en1
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