“As Europeans, and first and foremost as Franco-Germans, we need to be bolder and make far more joint public investments”, declared French President Emmanuel Macron in a speech on European youth delivered in Dresden early on Monday evening, 27 May, on the occasion of his state visit to Germany.
He said that this massive increase in investment will require a drastic increase in the European budget. “Let’s double our European budget, either through the size of the budget, or through joint borrowing, or through instruments that already exist”, he proposed.
In a joint op-ed published in the Financial Times, Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz call for a public and private investment effort. With regard to the EU budget, the two leaders agreed on “working on introducing new own resources”.
The idea of increasing the European budget, by whatever means, divides the Member States (see EUROPE 13416/1). For the time being, therefore, they are focusing more on mobilising existing private capital, which can support innovation, through the deepening of the Capital Markets Union.
Reduced regulatory burden. The EU27 agree on cutting red tape. The French and German leaders reiterate this in their op-ed. “We call for an ambitious bureaucracy reduction agenda to deliver on simpler and faster administrative procedures and cutting bureaucratic burdens for businesses of all sizes”, they explain.
Mr Macron and Mr Scholz are also advocating the removal of all barriers to movement within the internal market.
European preference. In Dresden, the French President also defended the concept of ‘European preference’ in future industrial policies. He said that the EU must not remain open at all costs in the face of China and the United States, which are promoting their own economies by using protectionist tools. “We need to have a European strategy that builds a European preference for defence and space, that builds a European purchasing strategy and enables us to have trade rules that build mirror clauses”, stressed Mr Macron.
In this area too, France is struggling to convince the EU Council. The Netherlands, Sweden, Finland, Denmark and also Germany are opposed to such measures, which they claim run counter to liberalism.
The language used in the Franco-German op-ed is also softened on these trade issues. Reciprocity and fair competition are mentioned, but certain ideas and general principles, such as the end of naivety, so important to Emmanuel Macron, are not included. (Original version in French by Léa Marchal)