Brussels, 05/02/2013 (Agence Europe) - The French president, François Hollande, is convinced that a reasonable agreement among all member states is possible on the Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) for 2014-2020 at the European Summit of 7 and 8 February. During a debate at the European Parliament (EP) on Tuesday 5 February, he said the MFF would be around 1% of EU wealth and should focus on growth and a special measure for young people. On the future of Europe, he repeated the French idea of greater integration alongside solidarity. Most MEPs, whether pro or anti-Europe, welcomed France's military action in Mali.
Hollande's speech set out the approach France is taking in the MFF talks. He started by explaining that savings should be made, but not at the cost of weakening the economy. He called for the new seven-year budget to be large enough to pay for the continuation of common policies, like cohesion policy and the common agricultural policy (CAP). The MFF for 2014-2010 should extend the €120 billion growth pact adopted by the European Summit in June 2012 (see EUROPE 10644) and give more cash to innovation, infrastructure and new forms of energy. The EU should use its budget to support the most fragile people in Europe, argued Hollande, hence the need to protect and properly use the funding for the most vulnerable, the European globalisation fund and the European social fund. Tackling youth unemployment should be turned into a full EU programme, he added, pointing out that France is calling for a fairer, more visible system of resources with the rebates to some countries no longer increasing. Hollande said that in the future, the EU budget should have independent sources of finance so that the European project would not be jeopardised by lack of political support for funding.
The French president quashed the rumour that France would be fighting the idea of money going towards growth stimulus in order to ensure the future of the CAP (of which France is the leading beneficiary), saying that there would be tough cuts and restructuring in the CAP and elsewhere. Making demands on the CAP, the joint leader of the Greens/EFA, German MEP Daniel Cohn-Bendit, said that the CAP should serve the interests of the majority, made up of small farmers, rather than the agri-food industry minority. He said 80% of the CAP cash goes to 20% of farmers. France, Germany and the United Kingdom oppose the idea of capping CAP funding per farm to €100,000 because 160 farms in France and 1200 in the EU receive more than €300,000 a year, he stated.
The MEPs expressed concern about the current MFF talks. The EP president, Martin Schulz, said the debate around the budget was a way for the European Parliament to send a renewed message to the member states that the EP is prepared to compromise, but not at any price. He said the European budget finances 94% of investment in the member states and has to be on a par with the EU's ambitions for the 21st century, but the most recent MFF proposals would lead to the EU budget in 2020 being no more than the equivalent of the 2005 budget, warning that the EP was not prepared to have the EU constantly run out of cash. Schulz pointed out that the EU would fall short by €16 billion in 2013 on its total budget of €132 billion.
It's all going in the wrong direction, said French MEP Joseph Daul, who is already prepared to reject any unsound deal. Aware of the spending restrictions in the member states in this time of financial crisis, he called for Europe to have a credible budget rather than dismantling EU policies the way the UK desires. Daul, head of the EPP Group at the EP, said the European Summit should give the EU budget greater flexibility among budget headings and from one one year to another, along with own resources. The head of the S&D Group, Austria's Hannes Swoboda, hoped the Franco-German couple would be able to unite to achieve an ambitious budget. Echoing Daul and Cohn-Bendit, he said the idea of a period in which the EU operates using annual budgets in order to allow more time to discuss the seven-year budget should not be feared as this could allow for a strong EU budget after the European elections in 2014. The head of the ALDE Group, Guy Verhofstadt of Belgium, asked whether it was really so difficult to get the European Council to understand that in times of austerity, it was better to pool rare resources than return EU resources to the member states. He slammed what he described as the budget scam currently in the brewing.
Extreme austerity criticised. Pointing out that France has signed up to a serious attitude to the budget, the French president said that Europe had to take up the challenge of growth and jobs at a time when 27 million were on the dole queue in the EU. He said that for this, deleveraging and increased competitiveness would be required, but budget rules needed to match the situation in each country and discernment utilised in terms of how long they should apply because otherwise, one would be condemning the EU to endless austerity, which he himself would not go along with. Budget surplus and highly competitive countries like Germany should boost domestic demand to enable the other member states to get their economies going again. Hollande said that, without infringing the ECB's independence, a new policy was needed for the euro to ensure the single currency reflected the economic facts.
On the future of Europe, Hollande repeated France's acceptance of greater inegration as long as it is accompanied by greater solidarity, because one was not possible without the other. He said integration could translate into tax harmonisation, structural reforms, R&D infrastructure, financing an energy transition and an Energy Community 60 years after the formation of the European Coal and Steel Community. He said that solidarity could be manifested through a guaranteed job for young people at the end of their studies and security in the event of professional transition and the introduction of a minimum wage. Solidarity could also be expressed in the form, he said, of a special budget for the eurozone, a tax on financial transactions and the launch of common lending.
Swoboda said the Growth Pact needed to be boosted to act as a counterbalance to the Budget Treaty, and should be accompanied by a “Social Pact”. He said that the Left had suggested some investment spending should be left out of the budget discipline calculations, but the Right in the European Parliament fiercely opposes the idea. Referring the crisis in the European steel industry, he said that a Europe without industry would be even more vulnerable in a globalised world. Cohn-Bendit agreed, adding that people in Europe today do not see economic recovery. Speaking on behalf of the GUE/NGL, Germany's Gabrielle Zimmer slammed the financial and housing speculation that has taken off again while workers' living standards are stagnating or falling and social expenditure is melting away. British Conservative Martin Callanan slammed the French government's policy of high taxation and a conditional fall in the retirement age, saying that this had a devastating impact in terms of international competitiveness.
EU Internal Market Commissioner Michel Barnier welcomed Hollande's suggestions on growth. Barnier told a handful of reporters that Europe must be given an ambitious industrial policy.
No “pick and mix” Europe. The French president called for a”differentiated” Europe, not a two-speed Europe or a pick-and-mix Europe, he explained, but a system whereby it was not aways the same countries moving foward and carrying out new harmonised projects, like the Schengen Area and the single currency.
This political idea of Europe's future is music to the ears of the leaders of the European Parliament's political parties. Guy Verhofstadt said Europe was the only area where national sovereignty can still be exercised. Swoboda said that Social Democrats say that a pick-and-mix Europe is not an option. French “euro-realists” viciously attacked the European project for being the opposite of what people desire. Philippe de Villiers (ELD) called for a referendum to put an end to the dream of European Nations merging through integration. Marine Le Pen (NI) slammed the EU for being under the thumb of bankers forcing through pay deflation in the eurozone.
French action in Mali welcomed. The French president said Europe had to play its part in the fight for democracy and human dignity in the world, which is why he had decided to intervene in Mali, adding that France had not done so to defend its own economic interests. A time will come in Mali in the future for political reconcilation of the various levels of Mali society, he said, along with expanding the country's economy, which will be the work of the African organisations in the country (see related article). Europe will participate in training the Mali army and development of the Sahel, promised Hollande. Apart from the GUE/NGL and Nigel Farage (ELD, UK), the EP welcomed the French intervention in Mali.
Asked about the location of the European Parliament's headquarters, Hollande defended the city of Strasbourg. In 2013, the year of the 50th anniversary of Franco-German friendship, he said history highlighted the role of Strasbourg in reconciliation between two countries that had been at war with each other.
Hollande said that in 2015, a United Nations conference on climate change would be held in France. (MB and MD/transl.fl)