Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2012-02-14-Speech-2-429-000"
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"en.20120214.21.2-429-000"2
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"Mr President, it is a pleasure for me to replace my dear colleague Olli Rehn. The consultation on the Green Paper on the stability bonds finished on 8 January. It is fair to admit that the feedback via the official channels of this consultation has been quite limited. We have received only 18 replies to the internet questionnaire and to DG ECFIN’s functional mail box. These replies came mostly from private citizens and to a lesser extent from different institutions.
The new economic governance as agreed by the European Council in December is a welcome development. We do need more fiscal consolidation, also in the context of the Eurobonds. As I have said before, Eurobonds without fiscal consolidation will not work, and I strongly believe that we will have to combine those two. In that respect, many respondents to the consultation of the Green Paper have pointed to the merits of keeping financial markets as a signalling and corrective device for the conduct of economic and fiscal policies in Member States. Hence, a full substitution of Member States’ issuance by common issuance would, according to those voices, not be advisable.
We have studied with interest some proposals to link joint issuance...
...explicitly to fiscal coordination by Member States and to limit the time frame of joint issuance, at least initially, to the time needed to redress Member States’ government accounts to sustainable levels. In particular the proposal of the German Council of Economic Experts for a debt redemption fund goes in that direction.
My last sentence – and this is my last sentence, Mr President – concerns an interesting issue. When mapping out the way forward we all will have to keep in mind the limitations of the approaches presented in the Green Paper and strike the right balance in terms of...
...respective advantages and disadvantages to market integration efficiency and stability. I count on the European Parliament to play an important and constructive role in this process.
Thus I would hesitate to consider this feedback as representative. I would also hesitate to consider those replies as substantially helping or guiding us in deciding about useful next steps as regards possible common issuance in the euro area.
Of course, in the mean time we have had many other informal contacts and consultations with a wide range of stakeholders, academics, financial institutions and government representatives. Also this House has been and will continue to be crucial in this debate. I am grateful for the first indications and views by Sharon Bowles and Sylvie Goulard on behalf of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs in their motion for a resolution of 21 December, and I would in particular like to thank Ms Goulard for all her initiatives.
These additional contacts have proved highly useful and productive. Yet they only further illustrate the basic choices and trade-offs that we face when envisaging any form of common issuance in the euro area. Such an instrument can deliver very tangible, positive results on the integration and stability of European capital markets.
The more ambitious our approach is, the higher benefits it will bring. At the same time the possible challenges remain daunting. We would have to ensure that solidarity and guarantees across Member States for the large-scale funding of governments do not weaken the incentives of governments to good fiscal behaviour.
What becomes clear from the consultations and informal contacts is the necessity to keep it simple. Complicated structures or instruments, based on complex financial engineering, are considered with a fair amount of suspicion and investors’ hesitance.
What is also clear is that stability bonds should not be reduced to being seen as just another item in the arsenal of potential short-term crisis tools. Yes, if deployed quickly, and depending on their specific form, they can make an important contribution to the current sovereign debt crisis, but in their essence Eurobonds or stability bonds have a much larger potential.
They can profoundly contribute to integrating European capital markets at their core, thereby fostering efficiency and the international attractiveness of Europe as an investment location. In brief, our goal should be to create a strong, simple and creditworthy new instrument that would be likely to become the new risk-free benchmark on European financial markets.
In terms of the next steps, given the ambitious goal and the importance of the issue, the Commission plans to further clarify the key issues linked to the introduction of Eurobonds. There are many quite technical topics to be analysed before any definite decisions are taken and we must take the time to do so, as nothing should be left to chance here."@en1
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"(Interjection from Mr Bloom: ‘This is totally ridiculous.’)"1
"(Interjection from Mr Bloom: ‘Three minutes, we’re now getting up to six – let’s do our job, Mr President.’)"1
"(Interjection from the President: ‘The time is also a barrier.’)"1
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