Brussels, 07/04/2014 (Agence Europe) - No to tax evasion, no to austerity and yes to protecting “ordinary” citizens, for whom “€1,000 is already a lot “.
On these themes, Martin Schulz of Germany, the candidate of the Party of European Socialists to take over from José Manuel Barroso, launched his campaign in Belgium on Friday 4 April.
Alongside Belgian Prime Minister Elio di Rupo and the former Italian prime minister Massimo d'Alema, whose think tank FEPS (Foundation for European Progressive Studies) organised the event, and the heads of the list for the European elections, Marie Arena and Kathleen Van Brempt, Schulz , who is currently President of the European Parliament, said that the Socialists had a “chance to win, to change Europe, to move Europe in a different direction”.
He wants the Europeans to take the Social Democrats seriously and has long focused on the fight against tax evasion. “If we get a majority in our favour, we will bring in measures to ensure that all companies contribute to the budgets”, not “just small businesses”, he said in French (our translation). “The country where the profit is made will be the country where the tax is paid”, the German official added by way of a slogan, attracting a great deal of applause.
Unlike Jean-Claude Juncker, his EPP rival, Schulz's motivation in standing for the top job at the Commission seems clear: “More Parliament means more social rights”, he said, but “at EU level, this does not work; the European Parliament needs the Commission” to launch protective legislation and that is why “we need to win the Commission”, said Schulz. “That is why I have decided to stand; this is the starting point to change Europe”.
Speaking slightly earlier about austerity policies, the Belgian prime minister had detailed how Belgium had refused to apply the budgetary recommendations of the European Commission to the letter and explained its rejection of the “obsession with trajectories”. The Socialists are “serious in management and, at the same time, we focused on recovery, because the number one objective is employment”, he said. This was a sensitive issue which, later that weekend, would turn the debate between the two main candidates ugly, with Schulz attracting the criticism from Juncker after intimating that he would be prepared to make concessions over France's deficits (see other article).
Another row which is still ranging concerns the status of Schulz, the president of the European Parliament, who is supposed to join the race for the Commission officially on 17 April, just after the last session of the Parliament, but who has been making speeches which are resolutely electoral in flavour for several weeks now. (SP)