Brussels, 21/12/2011 (Agence Europe) - European Council President Herman Van Rompuy has called the next meeting of EU leaders on 30 January. This European Council will be devoted officially to growth and employment but it will be dominated above all by the debt crisis and finalisation of the new compact on budgetary discipline on which discussions began on Tuesday 20 December.
“Our next summit is scheduled for (Monday) 30 January”, announced Van Rompuy in a video message released on Tuesday evening. Previously he had only spoken of this meeting taking place at the end of January or start of February, without setting a definite date.
Officially the first meeting of the heads of state and government of the 27 European Union countries will be devoted to employment, Van Rompuy stated. Nevertheless, this agenda could very well be relegated to second place given the need to find a response to the debt crisis that the still sceptical financial markets find convincing. “Bringing financial stability to the eurozone remains absolutely key for our future”, Van Rompuy said, speaking of leaders' “fundamental political will” to retain the monetary union and the legacy of the founding fathers.
Van Rompuy expressly elected to call a summit of all the countries of the EU and not just the eurozone, as France, in particular, and Germany wanted. Those close to Van Rompuy have indicated that he wants to keep everyone on board so as not to further widen the gap with the United Kingdom, which detached itself from the rest at the last Council on 8-9 December by refusing to agree to revision of the EU treaty to strengthen the budgetary discipline of the eurozone. The countries of the eurozone decided to push on by means of an intergovernmental agreement. Nine of the 10 non-eurozone countries are expected to join in.
Negotiations on the proposed intergovernmental agreement have begun in the working group. Each EU country has three representatives in the group (the head of the Treasury, the Ambassador to the EU and a legal expert) and the European Parliament (EP) has three representatives - Elmar Brok (EPP, Germany), Guy Verhofstadt (ALDE, Belgium) and Roberto Gualtieri (S&D, Italy). There was a relatively broad exchange of views on the proposed intergovernmental agreement. The aim is to toughen common budgetary discipline by imposing golden rules on returning to budgetary balance in all the national constitutions and by making sanctions against negligent states more automatic. A second meeting of this group is due to be held in the first week of January. These negotiations have to be completed by the end of January, coinciding with the next summit convened by Van Rompuy. It is planned that the agreement will be signed at the start of March.
The EP expressed some reservations. Gualtieri argued that the international agreement's goals could not only have been achieved through normal EU systems, but could have been achieved better. “I think all that is in this text could be achieved with EU legislation. Moreover, this text advocates monitoring of economic policies by member states, whereas the six pack (six legislative proposals on economic governance) gave this role to the Commission - imposing sanctions will be difficult if it relies on member state monitoring”, he said. Verhofstadt highlighted the role of EU institutions in ensuring effectiveness, legitimacy and accountability. “We need to place the Commission at the centre of the international agreement to have effective control, because peer pressure will not work. We also need to create democratic accountability by providing Parliament with political control”, he said. He also warned of “intergovernmental creep” and said that clear written commitments were needed to prevent other policies being developed outside the EU system. Another Liberal MEP, Sylvie Goulard (France) was concerned to see Europe focusing only on penalties. “Making Europe the bogeyman is a basic error. I cannot go with that. I cannot see myself trying to sell a Europe that behaves in such a way to my fellow citizens”, she said. “We are creating a monster”, she claimed. (LC/transl.rt)