Brussels, 20/05/2014 (Agence Europe) - Guy Verhofstadt from Belgium, the candidate from the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE) to be president of the European Commission, puts himself forward as an outsider able to unite a majority of member states and MEPs around his project. An ardent supporter of the Community method, the former prime minister of Belgium highlights for EUROPE his federalist-inspired programme - the main axis of which is economic integration in a series of key sectors such as energy and telecommunications. (Interview conducted by SP)
Agence Europe (AE): Flash polls conducted at the end of the election debate on 15 May put you in second place - just after Alexis Tsipras (see EUROPE 11081). How do you feel about the leader of the radical European Left appearing to be the most popular candidate?
Guy Verhofstadt (GV): There are other opinion polls that make me the winner of this debate! It was only an online opinion poll - and this type of study is not always very serious. The real opinion poll is the election. And the fact that over 100,000 tweets were reportedly exchanged on Twitter over the course of this debate (according to the data that went round) shows one thing - people are basically interested. This is good. It's a big development as we never experienced that in the past. To be sure, we could improve this exercise in the future - we protested against the “dual” format of some debates, for example - but it's a good start.
AE: Opinion polls consistently put you in third place after the EPP and S&D candidates. Is the European Commission moving further away?
GV: The president of the European Commission will not necessarily be the person with the biggest score. If I obtain this result and a bigger group, we will be pivotal.
My objective is to gather a majority of MEPs around my programme, which can clearly be distinguished from that of other parties. I share one thing with the eurosceptics - and that is that we need another Europe. Unlike the Conservatives, I do not say that the crisis is behind us and I don't deny the problems. We have not left the crisis behind, growth was only 0.2% of GDP for the first two months of 2014. And we are an alternative to the Socialists - we don't want to build on new debts. Alliances will be made on the content of our programmes, values. But we are first trying to gather a maximum of MEPs around us. I am running for the presidency of the Commission, not for another post and not in relation to the rumours doing the rounds.
AE: You regularly warn against an attempt from the member states to choose a Commission president from outside the official candidates. Is this a real risk?
GV: If I can give some advice to the heads of state and government, it would be not to destroy European democracy… I don't think that the European Parliament will allow such a thing to happen and there will be no possibility to appoint a Commission president without a majority in the Parliament. It's very clear.
AE: You argue for fresh integration in key sectors like energy and telecommunications. What does this mean in concrete terms?
GV: We need to make another leap and to take inspiration from what Jacques Delors did in the 1980s, which was a period of eurosclerosis similar to the one we are currently going through - and with countries in debt. Delors accomplished the single market. We need to do the same thing - to develop a European community in the sectors you've just mentioned, plus the banking sector. Banking union in particular needs to be completed. We need to try and create European giants in these areas - for example, in telecoms, where we can no longer continue with 28 different operators and regulators - and to use the European framework as a reference framework. We can also plan for joint purchases - in the area of energy, for example. This worked in 1992 - businesses began to invest and created jobs. Why wouldn't this work today?
AE: As regards the economy, what would your trademark be? What would you do with the contractual arrangements by which a country would commit to reforms in exchange for European aid?
GV: Without doubt, we need another kind of economic governance. The Lisbon Strategy and EUROPE 2020 are just documents - a catalogue of indices.
I'm not in favour of these individual contracts. I am in favour of rigour at the level of economic and monetary union, but I'm also in favour of freedom of action for the member states to conduct their reforms in what I call a “convergence framework”. We need beacons at the European level with minimum obligatory parameters. And freedom of action for the rest.
AE: Should the posts of President of the Eurogroup and Commissioner for Economic Affairs be merged?
GV: As regards the economy, I certainly support grouping competences in the form of “clusters” - on the Stability Pact, for example.
But I'm of the opinion that power should be given to the Commission rather than to the member states.
AE: ALDE supports tax competition while fighting against tax evasion. This is a position opposed to that of the Socialists which wants a standard minimum tax for companies.
GV: Yes, we support competition in this area. Without it, we will see an increase in taxes everywhere in Europe and a loss of competitiveness.
As regards tax evasion, we need to set a common definition.