Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2012-05-22-Speech-2-363-000"
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"en.20120522.18.2-363-000"2
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"Mr President, in many Member States, all the stops are being pulled out in order to get our economy back on its feet and to get the budget under control. I have respect for countries such as Ireland, Portugal, Spain and Italy for the efforts they are putting in, but also for a country in a completely different part of Europe, namely Poland, our beacon of growth in eastern Europe.
The third priority for our group is increasing investments that actually contribute to growth. Sooner rather than later, we need to tackle research and innovation, investment in infrastructure, utilising unspent European funds and the role of the European Investment Bank, including in relation to project bonds. I hope that we can now get going on all of this really quickly.
Mr President, I would like to wish you a great deal of wisdom, including tomorrow and in the run-up to the European Council. We are on your side in order to also realise these priorities.
Mr President, we are making progress, but the situation remains very fragile, and the engine of growth is faltering. We therefore have to go all out to safeguard our social market economy. We have to do our utmost to tackle unemployment and, above all, unacceptably high levels of youth unemployment, as well as to ensure a strong small and medium-sized business sector as an important jobs creator for our economy. That need is urgent, and we need to be creative in searching to find the solution, not least in order to safeguard a future for our social model.
Mr President, our group advocates economic growth built on strong foundations. We advocate sustainable economic growth rather than economic growth built on quicksand. Simply focusing on spending more money and increasing our debts is not the path we advocate, as that would mean passing on our debts to the next generation. Growth is not a magic spell that enables us to avoid painful and sometimes unpopular measures.
No, if we really do tackle the problems now, we can provide a sense of perspective and regain people’s confidence. That is our goal. Our group stands for tangible solutions, and these involve implementing reforms in order to return government finances to good health and reforms in order to return the foundations of our economy to good health.
It is also clear from the report published by the OECD today that priority efforts are required in this regard. These reforms will cause some pain, but in the long run, they will bring in money instead of costing it. The first, most important priority in this is competitiveness. If we re-establish that, then we can once again occupy a sturdy position in export markets, provide jobs for our people and ensure economic growth. In particular – as I said already – the big issue has to be youth unemployment. We have to provide an opportunity for our young people again, and to do so we also need to establish binding targets in the Member States. Easy access to finance for small and medium-sized enterprises is thus an important priority.
Mr President, we need to go further with reforms. We need to continue the efforts based on the ‘six-pack’, the Stability and Growth Pact and macro-economic surveillance, and the Commission has, for the first time, an important role to play here in evaluating the plans of the Member States. I call on the Commission to be ambitious. Highlight good examples, but also let us see where there are deficiencies and greater efforts are needed.
The second focal area for the Group of the European People’s Party (Christian Democrats) is our internal market. Mr President, we may have heard the new French President, Monsieur Hollande, talking about growth, but we have not heard him talk about tangible reforms that he will introduce in France in order to return the French economy to good health. We have also heard nothing from President Hollande about how he intends to promote the internal market. It alone can already deliver 2% economic growth
and we have more work to do in that regard, in the interests of Europe’s 500 million consumers. There is a great deal of potential that remains unexploited.
I am pleased, Commissioner, that you referred to the European patent, as that is something that we really should be sorting out quickly at this point. There should also be harmonised rules on data protection and legislation for professional qualifications. In addition, we know that, in many areas, European legislation is in place, but that there is a failure in implementation. This also applies to infringement procedures, which are too slow and too toothless.
Perhaps we also need to be much more active in terms of reporting in connection with the European Semester; producing reports, naming and shaming, and making it clear where things need to be better, including in that area. Linked to the internal market, red tape is also important and needs to be tackled. An extra 25%."@en1
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