The European Commissioner-designate for Prosperity and Industrial Strategy, Stéphane Séjourné, made quite a good impression at his hearing at the European Parliament on Tuesday 12 November. At a time when the EU is seeking to boost its competitiveness, the former head of the Renew Europe group in the European Parliament was expected to talk about the resources needed to ensure that industry prospers. Simplification, decarbonisation and financing were at the heart of MEPs’ questions.
While the chairs of the Industry (ITRE) and Environment (ENVI) committees did not really comment on the quality of the candidate’s speech, Anna Cavazzini (Greens/EFA, German), who chairs the Committee on the Internal Market (IMCO), gave a positive assessment of Mr Séjourné’s performance. The fact that he has highlighted the decarbonisation of industry is “quite positive”, she believes.
Simplification. Once again, MEPs agreed on the need to reduce the administrative and regulatory burden on businesses, a subject on which there were many questions. Work in this area will be steered by the European Commissioner-designate, Valdis Dombrovskis, who has already announced his intentions (see EUROPE 13515/17), but Mr Séjourné also covered the subject at some length, because this mandate “will be one of simplification”, according to him.
He stressed that simplifying the rules would primarily benefit small businesses and the public authorities, while several Members of Parliament asked him about his intentions with regard to social rights. “Simplification is social”, he said twice. And he took as an example the subject of public procurement, where he also intends to change the rules. “Public procurement contracts are very complicated to apply for certain contracting authorities. We have six directives, around 39 delegated acts and two regulations at European level alone. So we need a major act of simplification”.
On several occasions, he has also reassured us of the importance of the environmental standards adopted as part of the ‘Green Deal’, and of the continuity he wishes to follow with regard to the climate transition. “Let’s not make any mistake on what this is about: I want to reduce bureaucracy and simplify as much as possible, but that doesn’t mean deregulation”, he insisted.
Support for clean industry. So industrialisation goes hand in hand with decarbonisation, according to Stéphane Séjourné, who emphasised the need to support strategic industrial sectors that have major needs in the climate transition. Steel, aluminium, the automotive industry, the chemical industry and clean technologies are all sectors that the EU must support, according to the Commissioner-designate.
Members of Parliament were curious to know more about how the Commission will defend the interests of these sectors. “How do you intend to protect our automotive industry from excessive regulations that threaten our industrial prosperity?” asked Filip Turek (PfE, Czech), referring to the targets for reducing CO2 emissions from light vehicles.
Mr Séjourné believes that the final objectives should not be called into question. He therefore set out to describe how the Commission can support manufacturers in achieving these targets. “I can help create more demand for electric cars in the years to come. We have support schemes, such as social leasing, for purchasing and loans. There are also business vehicle fleets, which today account for 58% of vehicles and can be a reservoir”.
Alongside the car industry, the steel industry, which is suffering from a drastic fall in production in the Union, also had a place in the discussion. “We won’t let it die”, were the candidate’s assurances in response to several questions from Dan Nica (S&D, Romanian), who is concerned about this sector. Mr Séjourné guaranteed that the Commission would present an action plan on steel. He also undertook to replace the safeguard measures protecting the EU from so-called unfair steel imports with a permanent mechanism.
Financing. In line with the conclusions of the ‘Draghi’ report on competitiveness, a number of MEPs questioned the Commissioner-designate on his intentions regarding public funding for industry. He therefore gave some indication of the content of the ‘European Competitiveness Fund’, which he will be presenting shortly, without straying too far from the written answers already provided to MEPs (see EUROPE 12510/13).
According to Stéphane Séjourné, the fund should be simple and targeted. In this sense, prioritisation by strategic sector is essential. Few details are known at this stage about the form this instrument will take, but it should fill in the gaps where a company wants to up its strategy but lacks financing, said the candidate. The aim is “to avoid seeing industrial projects go elsewhere, and to continue to support research and production”. He also shared his wish to see this fund participate in the IPCEI.
However, public funding cannot do everything, and Mr Séjourné was quick to stress the importance of mobilising private capital. In his view, public investment should above all serve as a lever for private investment.
Candidate legitimacy. In addition to his written answers, the Commissioner-designate was questioned by members of the PfE and ENS groups about his legitimacy as Commissioner. According to them, Mr Séjourné owes his presence on the College of Commissioners solely to “a whim” of the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen.
“I want to be judged on industry, on the state of the internal market, on results. Don’t judge me on my style or the image you may have of me, or on whether my relationship with the President is better or worse than [the one she had] with my predecessor”, Stéphane Séjourné pleaded in response to a remark by Sarah Knafo (ENS, French).
As for the quality of his relationship with the President of the Commission, the former Minister of Foreign Affairs felt that “having good relations with colleagues was quite an asset for furthering ideas”. (Original version in French by Léa Marchal)