Brussels, 14/03/2013 (Agence Europe) - On Thursday 14 March, at the opening of the spring summit on the economic situation in Europe (see EUROPE 10805), the difficulties relating to the economic adjustments that many Europeans are having to make in their daily lives, were on everyone's lips. Nonetheless, European leaders remain convinced that the efforts being made will result in growth and job creation and maintain the line that they have set: differentiated and growth-promoting consolidation of public must be pursued and its social repercussions be tackled as best as possible.
Following the tripartite meeting with social partners, the Irish prime minister, Enda Kenny declared that none of the leaders can be happy with a situation in which 26 million of the people they represent are on the dole. He admitted that economic adjustment programmes currently in place are hurting a lot of people and he urged political leaders and social partners to show “leadership” and work together to provide Europeans with hope. He added that they had to be creative and efficient in using resources, particularly with regard to the Multiannual Financial Framework for 2014-2020 (which will allocate €6 billion to tackling youth unemployment: Ed.), completing the single market and boosting trade with international partners.
With thousands of demonstrators taking to the streets in Brussels, the Luxembourg prime minister, Jean-Claude Juncker, said on arriving at the summit that he did not rule out the fact that Europe might be running the risk of social rebellion. According to Juncker, there has to be better explanation of the policy based on the simple idea that just adding deficit onto deficit created even greater risks. The German chancellor, Angela Merkel, said that the resources in the Growth Pact should be mobilised as a priority to help young people find jobs. The French president, François Hollande, said that “flexibility is necessary if we want to return to growth but at the same time the trajectory needs confirming. The only priority today is growth. If there's too much rigidity, there will be too much unemployment”.
During the tripartite summit, the president of the European Council, Herman Van Rompuy, noted the disparity between relative financial stability and “social suffering”. According to him, despite encouraging signs, it will still be a long road for restoring our prospects for growth, re-invigorating our economies, cleaning up our banking sectors, creating jobs and improving the welfare state. He underlined the four priority areas of the economic strategy advocated and included in the most recent summit conclusions (see our account Twitter @AgencEurope): - maintaining financial stability; - cleaning up public finances in a “differentiated way, which is focused on structural efforts”; - fighting unemployment and tackling social inequality, “because budgetary consolidation does not prevent us from launching policies that are also necessary”; - strengthening the potential for competitiveness.
There are flagrant disagreements between the social partners. While everyone recognises the need to consolidate public finances, the unions raise the question of the pace of these efforts, which they believe are mainly being undertaken on the backs of the workers. Speaking on behalf of the European Trade Union Confederation, Bernadette Ségol, said that the policies being carried out are not achieving their objective: “We are in a recession, unemployment is continually rising, the confidence of people in Europe is further decreasing”. She argued that calling for “structural” reforms as advocated by employers' representatives (BusinessEurope, UEAPME) would once again be done on the backs of ordinary people. She warned that attacking collective bargaining systems, creating pressure on wages and cutting public services and social protection meant cutting to the heart of the European social model. (MB/transl.fl)