Brussels, 16/12/2014 (Agence Europe) - If asked for their evaluation of the first years of the Six-Pack and the Two-Pack, the two texts which revised the Stability Pact, many of the MEPs of the EPP and ALDE groups, disappointed by the recent decisions of the Commission on the draft national budgets, particularly the one to allow France a brief respite, would say that the Commission should not risk the credibility of the Pact by shrinking from the proper application of the budgetary rules.
This is basically the message they sent out, on Tuesday 16 December, to the vice-president of the Commission, Valdis Dombrovskis, who came to discuss the revision of the two rafts of legislation with them. The S&D group called for movement on the question of flexibility, a point on which the Commission has pledged a communication for early next year.
As Dombrovskis pointed out, the revision clause provides for an assessment of the effectiveness of the Six-Pack and the Two-Pack, the impact on improving the coordination of economic policy and on a sustained convergence of the economic performance of the member states. The Commission takes the view that experience is “limited” as the texts have only been in force for two years, that “a number of elements are untested” and, in particular, that the system is applied in specific economic conditions.
The MEP Burkhard Balz (EPP, Germany) stressed that compliance with the rules was a “non-negotiable condition of a competitive economy” and that the Commission should not draw any distinction between large states and small when assessing the application of these rules. Referring to the Commission's decision to give France extra time, a situation she described as “unsatisfactory”, the Dutch MEP Cora van Nieuwenhuizen (ALDE) also raised this point. “If the Commission hesitates, then the whole process will fall”, added French MEP Alain Lamassoure (EPP). Sven Giegold (Greens/EFA, Germany) suggested that the Commission “would not dare to apply” its own rules.
The S&D appears to have been left wanting. Pervenche Berès (France), rapporteur on this dossier, said that she was very much looking forward to the Commission's communication on flexibility. Belgium's Hugues Bayet (S&D) lamented the fact that on the pretext of evaluation, the Commission is presenting only a technical communication, with no elements about the evolution of unemployment and poverty. Ernest Urtasun (Greens/EFA, Spain) said that the Commission should not have a vision to have reached the conclusion that no revision was necessary. Amongst other things, he argued in favour of a different treatment of debt, given the fact that this has been made considerably greater by the bailout of the banking sector. His colleague Philippe Lamberts (Belgium) said that the rules should allow an “upward convergence of the social, environmental and democratic standards”.
Other groups and a number of unaffiliated members took the opportunity to stress that economic governance had been a failure. These included the Portuguese member of the GUE/NGL, Marisa Matias, who stressed that her group had always argued in favour of disregarding investments in the calculation of the deficits. Beatrix von Storch (ECR, Germany) jokingly told the vice-president of the Commission that when listening to his speech, she had made a note of all the successes he referred to and had ended up with a blank sheet of paper.
Among the MEPs' proposals, Ramon Tremosa i Balcells (ALDE, Spain) recommended that the regional governments with budgetary competencies be taken into account more and Hungary's Tibor Szanyi (S&D) argued for these rules be put into plainer language for the benefit of civil society.
Petr Mach (EFDD, Czech Republic) called for a provision to allow the states to come out of the euro and Bernard Monot (unaffiliated, France) stated that economic efforts are focused on poor spending decisions. Lastly, Maria Joao Rodrigues (S&D, Portugal) called for the national contributions to the European Fund for Strategic Investments to be neutral for the purposes of the Stability Pact (EUROPE 11216). On this point, Dombrovskis reiterated that these contributions would be treated favourably, in other words that they would count in the debt and the deficit, like any other expenditure, but would not trigger any specific procedure under the Stability and Growth Pact if the states exceeded the thresholds in place by an amount equal to or less than their contribution to the fund. He then went on to point out that some of the MEPs' comments had nothing to do with the revision of the texts. (EL)