Overdramatising. Preparation for the Barcelona Summit has been generally positive at Community institutional levels, rather diverse and contradictory at a governmental level and provoked overdramatisation in the press. This has resulted in a certain confusion in public opinion. The meaning of the Summit could be summed up in the sentence - "finding the spirit of Lisbon"; which enabled the EU to set out the objective of becoming within the next ten years, "the most competitive knowledge-based economy in the word". Added to this objective were the successive Summit Acquis of full employment, an end to budget deficits by 2004 and sustainable development. Nothing much to apologise about! It is not going to be surprising or scandalous if the deadline for attaining these objectives has experienced some setbacks. Firstly, no programme as ambitious as this would succeed in implementing the objectives without some timetable problems; delays are inevitable. Secondly, the global economic slowdown and the fallout after 11 September have upset the projects and the deadlines to a certain extent. At Barcelona, Heads of Government must reaffirm the goals, stick to the main objectives and attempt to make up for lost time. This will not be possible unless the essential characteristics of the Lisbon Programme are respected, namely, maintaining a balance between the objectives of liberalisation and opening up the markets, combined with the social objectives - clearly indicated and numbered - whilst respecting the principles of sustainable development. Easy to say difficult to carry out.
A Fact of Life. We are currently experiencing a dangerous case of drift. Some of the players are more inclined to stress liberalisation and opening up the markets, in the hope that the social objectives will follow automatically, while others sometimes create the impression of going backwards when it comes to creating large, open and competitive European markets. If the balance between the different factors is broken, the whole edifice risks collapsing. In fact, the objectives and the timetable for attaining them necessitate choices in economic policy and the kind of society we want - something upon which Member States are not always at one, simply because those in power are not the same. This is a fact of life that must be accepted because it's not going to disappear and elections on the horizon will change the situation once again. The reality is even more complex, for the government of the left in the United Kingdom and the government of the right in Italy are bound by a common document on the sensitive subject of labour market flexibility. Thus, simplistic formulas have become outmoded.
The Common Basis is Large and Solid. Fortunately, the "common basis", represented by the decisions already taken and the programmes already approved, thanks to the "spirit of Lisbon", is sufficiently large and solid for building the essential and targeting the most important objectives. The Community institutions must work on this common basis. The Commission is trying its best to do so, as the weighty documentation in preparation for Barcelona bears out and the Presidency of the Council now gives the impression of fully playing its role in seeking out compromises where necessary. Some governments are more fully involved in seeking "convergence" than others, by trying to find points on which they can agree in the different domains and work out a number of joint documents. This is both understandable and valid; but the press has often transformed the specific convergencies into so-called global and lasting alliances. Therefore, just a few days away from the Summit, we find ourselves in a situation that is rather confusing and potentially dangerous.
It would be an illusion and even undesirable if we wished to totally escape from having to make some ideological choices and the social dialectic expressed by the ETUC (European Trade Union Confederation) and by UNICE (Employers) is logical and to be welcomed; the behaviour of the ETUC is appreciated and recognised by all. But no Member State can claim that the new European choices systematically conform to the economic guidelines of their current government. They have to accept that choices already made are respected according to the balance between the objectives, as set out at Lisbon. The common basis could allow the important decisions in the three main fields for discussion at Barcelona: employment; economic reforms; investment in know-how. Of course, as usual, "the devil is in the detail" if we can define detail as issues that are often of great economic and social significance, linked to the "European model of society".
Employment Policies: Divergences and Convergencies. Let's examine the dossiers on employment policy and the labour market. The Spanish Presidency document suggests measures that aim to: improve incentives for increasing the demand for work and encouraging geographical mobility for workers. All the Ministers support these guidelines and stress that they promote employment, for workers themselves, when all is said and done. But some quarters are opposed to the wage differences based on workers' productivity and measures that facilitate redundancies; even the systematic encouragement of work mobility does not receive unanimous support. The definition of the flexibility of the labour market requires a great deal of caution in choosing its words and concepts. On the other hand, there is much convergence on other elements of employment policy, for example, on the need to put a stop to the incredible waste of skills, the social deprivation and the ludicrous costs in certain Member States due to the extremely low level of those employed in the 55-64 age group. In Belgium, this level stands at 22% and lower than 30% in four other member States (Luxembourg, Italy, Austria and France); it is around 30% and 40% in the Netherlands, Spain, Finland and Germany. Only Sweden (61.1%) and Denmark (51.4%) are above the 50% level fixed at the Stockholm Summit for the entire EU by 2010, with the United Kingdom coming close. This objective is justified by the ageing of the population and will call for radical changes in the pension systems.
Energy - More Progress than Disagreement for Most Part. The most controversial and most spectacular issue is liberalisation of the energy sector, for reasons that are both political and economic. Both the Spanish Presidency and European commission lay a lot of store on the issue but the French-German Front prevented the signing of an agreement at the Gothenburg Summit. This is combined with the general problem of public utilities and services, where doctrinal diverges are still strong etc. The ECOFIN Council did not manage this week to smooth out all the differences between France and the majority of other Member States on the issue of electricity. But negative commentaries appear excessive to me because they are ignoring an essential fact: an agreement in principle exists on total liberalisation of this market for industrial users in 2003 (for the gas market in 2004). Divergence focus on individual consumers, for whom France is unwilling to fix a date. It believes that a horizontal Directive should be fixed first. "Public Services" provide users with a number of guarantees such as, not allowing the electricity to be cut off for the poorest section of society, price equality over a given territory, price equalisation. The Vice President of the Commission, Loyola de Palacio is doubtful whether a general directive would be appropriate and is more in favour of binding standards in a specific electricity directive. We will see what come out of the Summit but two essential points appear to have been achieved: next year's liberalisation of the professional users' market (which will resolve the thorny problem of asymmetry in the opening up of the markets, which would appear to favour "Electicité de France" (EDF) and provoked a number of spectacular repercussions last year) and the taking into consideration of public service responsibilities. It is a fundamental step forward compared to the past, when even the notion of public utilities and services was misunderstood or argued over. And it will allow the Commission to renounce having to use Article 86 (new) of the Treaty to impose a liberalisation timetable, a measure that should be avoided as much as possible as this provision represents in my opinion an anomaly in the legal system that is founded on an equilibrium between the institutions and in keeping with the Community method.
The Overall Result Could Prove Largely Positive. I could describe the very important stakes that exist in the debates at the Summit at great length, stakes that are sometimes almost hidden under seemingly doctrinal labels. Despite the divergences that will remain at next week's Barcelona Summit, the overall result could prove largely positive if ideological choices are rejected and we acknowledge that we can't get everything we want. The Lisbon spirit, with its ambitious objectives, could effectively be safeguarded and re-launched, if all the Heads of government maintain the balance between the economic, social and environmental objectives. New deadlines could be worked out or added to the Lisbon timetable such as, for example: the adoption in 2003 of the new Directive on take-overs (which requires much clarification) and the European Open Sky in 2004. The dossier on financial services has recently made headway, thanks to Parliament's sense of responsibility and could be accomplished by 2005. Commitments need to be worked out such as on the suppression of budget deficits..
After the "surprising words" we alluded to in this section (21 February) President Aznar has ruled out "secret alliances" between Member States; it is the EU together that must go forward, the European model of society must become clear and concrete, something that goes beyond ideological differences that are sometimes more imaginary that real.
(F.R.)