Strasbourg, 08/03/2005 (Agence Europe) - On Tuesday in Strasbourg, in reaction to Eurogroup's work and that of the Ecofin Council for improving economic governance in the EU, the EPP-ED and ALDE groups at the European Parliament sharply criticised the Franco-German attempt to introduce greater flexibility into the Stability and Growth Pact (pp 7-9).
During a press conference, Graham Watson (UK), president of the ALDE group criticised the German Chancellor for acting like a bull in a china shop and destroying European solidarity. Watson did not hold back any punches and accused Mr Schröder of having acted in order to satisfy his own internal political agenda but would, as a result, make the EU's macro-economic problems worse. Watson called for strengthening budgetary discipline. Within the same group, Marielle de Sarnez (France, UDF) called on Member States to control public spending and not leave the debt for the next generation to sort out. She insisted that, “rules have to be strict but fair” but should not be amended on the basis of what someone likes or does not like. She indicated that her group agreed to a single area of flexibility: taking into account the economic cycle (greater subtleness in hard times but more effort in reducing the deficit in periods of strong economic growth).
Without rejecting the idea of more flexibility in the application of the pact, the president of the EPP-ED group, Hans-Gert Pottëring (CDU) warned against illusions that greater debt in countries could lead to more growth. Pottëring said that they considered that this would be mistaken. He also opposed the exclusion of whole areas of spending from the 3% GDP calculation. He was encouraged by Member States' stricter application of the rules and their firmness in keeping to their position, “We regret that it is the German government that is pronouncing the death of European monetary stability”.
Unsurprisingly, the president of the Socialist group, Martin Schulz (SPD) was more circumspect but sought to defend Germany, nonetheless, “Things are moving. According to my group, all measures that contribute to transforming the stability pact into a pact for growth are acceptable”. Co-president of the Greens-EFA Daniel Cohn-Bendit said that for the instant they did not see a real alternative in any of the proposals on the table. He recognised that if the pact were too complicated it could never be applied. He pointed out that his group was for the pact taking into account investments decided by Europe.