Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2012-07-04-Speech-3-016-000"
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"en.20120704.3.3-016-000"2
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"Mr President, let me first of all thank President Christofias for his speech today and for the welcome that he gave to my group when we recently visited Cyprus. We greatly appreciated the constructive meetings that we had with him and his government. It is clear that we are not going to have much in common politically, but nevertheless we did appreciate his courtesy and his hospitality. We also agree with the implication in the Presidency’s priorities that the EU is not seen as relevant by many of its citizens, and that it needs to become more effective and more efficient. The position of my group is clear: we do not want to see the EU fail, but if it continues to pursue the agenda of the past then it most surely will.
Let me say a word to President Barroso. I was particularly surprised by his outburst yesterday here in this Chamber. To suggest that somehow we take great delight in the problems facing the euro is, frankly, absurd. Do you honestly believe that we are pleased to see so many people suffer as a result of your political project? I have merely many times set out the options for the eurozone as I see them: either an effective fiscal union or a reduction in the size of the eurozone. At the moment you are trying to move towards a political union without the fiscal union that is really required, and I think that it is entirely reasonable that we should raise the alarm about what this will mean for national democracy in many Member States.
Whether or not the euro survives, what is important for me is that those countries that had the good sense to stay out of it are not hampered by the decision of 17 to go ahead with more integration, if indeed that is what they choose to do. But of course, the one tool that must always remain the equal property of the 27 countries is the single market. It is the one thing that we all support, and I was therefore delighted see that the Cyprus Presidency has said that one of its ambitions is the deepening of that internal market. You will have our full support in that aim.
The Presidency will also conclude negotiations on the Capital Requirements Directive. Yesterday, as part of his criticisms, President Barroso pointed out – correctly – the UK’s significant bank bailout commitments made under our previous, Socialist, government. I agree with him that we should ensure that banks are sufficiently capitalised to present this from ever happening again. So why, then, is the Commission still trying to water down the commitments the EU made in Basel to implement the Capital Requirements Directive? Mr Barroso, my group, and indeed the UK Government, is in favour of more stringent bank regulation than your Commission. We want to make sure that taxpayers never again have to bail out the banks.
Turning very briefly to the multiannual financial framework, it still continues to baffle me how the Commission can enforce austerity on Member States and simultaneously demand more money from them for the EU budget. It seems that everyone has to cut spending, apart from the European Commission. The idea that throwing money at economic problems and hoping it will make them go away is surely a doctrine that was discredited in the 1970s. If the Presidency can truly deliver a budget that genuinely focuses on quality and added value, and on better spending rather than on more spending, you will indeed have our full support."@en1
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