Brussels, 04/12/2007 (Agence Europe) - On Tuesday 4 December, with publication of its “EU Reform Barometer”, BusinessEurope calls on the European Commission, which will be publishing its own assessment of the situation on 11 December, not to make an in-depth recasting of the guidelines of the next Lisbon strategy three-year cycle. Most of the earlier recommendations to member states remain valid for 2008 and the integrated guidelines should remain “broadly untouched”, the European employers' organisation stresses, mainly expressing disappointment at the way member states have implemented reforms. Emphasis must be placed on this and “we expect the Commission to set out quite clearly who does what”, Philippe de Buck, the organisation's general secretary, told the press as he presented the results of the study providing a detailed assessment of reform progress in 2007 in four areas (labour market, public finance and social systems, innovation and research, and the business environment). On the basis of an assessment of progress made by the BusinessEurope national member federations, the barometer provides a snapshot of reforms in 2007. Results must therefore be assessed in relation to the initial level of reform and the efforts made earlier.
Companies create jobs and the renewed Lisbon strategy has shown its worth, but sound growth has not been sufficiently exploited to make the reform agenda move forward in 2007, the study states. It is to be noted that a number of strong growth economies - such as Bulgaria, Estonia and Slovakia and, to a lesser extent, Spain, Poland, the Czech Republic, Lithuania (as well as Norway) - have registered progress generally below the EU average, but the worst score goes to Italy. Despite economic growth, the performance of Germany is slower than expected while that of France has been assessed in a more positive light. Countries such as Hungary and Denmark have also made progress above the general average despite relatively weak growth. In a more favourable environment, Sweden, the Netherlands and Ireland made significant growth and, to a certain extent, the United Kingdom also. Slovenia, Cyprus and Malta continue, as part of their effort to join the eurozone, to make relatively good progress when it comes to reform. The barometer and other information is available on: http://www.businesseurope.eu/Content/Default.asp?PageId=491. (A.B.)