Brussels, 22/03/2001 (Agence Europe) - In their contributions to the European Council of Stockholm, described on Wednesday by President Prodi as broadly corresponding to the priorities set out in the Commission's Synthesis Report (see EUROPE of 8 February, p.7), the EU Member States all recognise the need to pursue economic reforms in order to implement the Lisbon strategy, but with nuances and sometimes even with altogether different approaches. Thus, some Member States insist above all on progress, from 2001, on the taxation issue (Germany for example), while others insist on setting in place a true European capitals market from mid-2002 (the United Kingdom). Still others hope the Broad Economic Policy Guidelines will play a clearly more important role in the future (France). The problem on which discussions in Stockholm are likely to focus, however, is that of liberalisation of the energy markets. Countries like the United Kingdom and Spain are in favour of full liberalisation of energy markets by 2003, while Germany and the Netherlands propose 2004, and France considers the fixing of binding dates as premature (and at the Palatinate summit on Tuesday evening, Chancellor Schröder said he shared this approach: see yesterday's EUROPE, p.4).
Furthermore, the Member States mainly insist on the following priorities:
1) Employment and new European labour markets. Labour mobility must be discussed during the Laeken Summit end 2001, say the Netherlands, while Italy hopes the recommendation on the abolition of obstacles to the mobility of students, trainees, teachers, young volunteers and trainers will be adopted in June 2001. The Netherlands and Germany hope for reform of the social security systems in 2002 and the United Kingdom and the Netherlands call for the establishment of indicators on employment and social cohesion during the year 2001. As far as the rate of employment is concerned, Italy calls for intermediary employment rates to be established for 2005 (65% of the population as a whole and 55% for women). Italy, moreover, hopes there will be proposals on the modernisation of social security systems for migrant workers by 2002, and the establishment of a social security card end 2001, while the Netherlands calls for the adoption of a directive on the financing of pension schemes in 2002. Belgium, for its part, announces that, at the summit of Laeken in December, it will aim to introduce a new "work quality" indicator that may be added to the 35 indicators discussed in Nice, or replace one of them. France is apparently also in favour of indicators on the quality of work (based, for example, on conditions of equality between men/women, reconciliation of professional and family life, and worker consultation and participation) to be integrated in the broad lines for employment for 2002.
2) Financial services market. The United Kingdom calls for objectives to be established for integration in 2002, and Denmark, Ireland and Spain consider that the Stockholm Summit should implement action plans for financial services and venture capital in 2004 and 2002 respectively.
3) Information society. Ireland hopes the e-Europe action plan will be implemented in 2002, and Italy calls for the Stockholm Summit to back the idea of setting up an e-government in the context of the e-Europe action plan, also in 2002.
4) Research and innovation. Ireland and the Netherlands calls for the development in 2001 of a European Area of Research and Innovation and, in 2003, for all obstacles to the employment of skilled workers from abroad to be lifted.
In addition to the contributions made by each Member State to the summit, there are also bilateral initiatives, such as: - an Italian-British paper on SMEs, identifying the need to act on financial matters and the development of electronic commerce in particular; - a letter from the Irish and British prime ministers, Bertie Ahern and Tony Blair; - a joint declaration by the British and Dutch Prime Ministers Tony Blair and Wim Kok.