The main parties appear to back the former Italian Prime Minister’s plans to boost the EU’s slow growth.
Mario Draghi appears to have impressed senior MEPs with his plans to boost the slow economic growth of the EUbut not everyone is convinced.
Draghi, former president of the European Central Bank and former prime minister of Italy, will probably publish his report on European competitiveness next week, possibly on Mondaybut yesterday (September 4) he informed MEPs of his conclusions.
Manfred Weber, leader of the European People’s Party (EPP), told the press after the meeting: “The big message that competitiveness is the number one issue…as the business party of Europe, we very much welcome this.”
“The last five years have been the years of the ‘Green Deal’… based on this report, we open the next chapter,” he added.
Weber, who represents the largest political party in the European Parliament, cited the need for emblematic European projects in the style of Airbusand the need to ensure that environmental technologies such as heat pumps and electric cars are produced in Europe and not in the United States or China.
Draghi’s report, initially scheduled for June, was requested last year by the President of the Commission, Ursula von der Leyenalso from the EPP, and follows in the wake of another report by former Italian Prime Minister Enrico Letta.
In April, Letta said he had sounded a “big red alarm” over the growing economic gap with the United States, and called for reform of the rules of the energy marketlas telecommunications and the financial services.
Cautious reception
Draghi’s conclusions – which are said to include specific recommendations for ten key economic sectors, perhaps along similar lines to Letta’s – won a more cautious reception from others in Parliament.
“What I like is that clearly defends European values“, such as public services and climate change, said Bas Eickhout, co-leader of the Greens group in the European Parliament. “It is sounding the alarm very clearly.”
“You won’t see anything in the report that mentions labor costs, because he has said that is not the problem,” Eickhout added, attempting to respond to a criticism that the report will be used to justify pay cuts to workers.
Instead, the report will examine Europe’s “complacency” in the face of high energy costs and the low productivity in important high-tech sectorshe added.
The support of left-wing MEPs is much more nuanced. In a statement, the leader of the socialist group, Iratxe García, said that any economic relaunch must be “built on quality jobs and affordable energy,” including a “Green and European Procurement Law.”
Others, like Manon Aubry, from the Left of the European Parliamentwere not impressed by either Draghi’s conclusions or his candor.
“It was a lip service presentation that didn’t say much,” Aubry told reporters after the meeting, adding that MEPs had been “left in the dark.”
“I would like us to talk about competitiveness, but then we would have to question the European trade policy that has sold out our industry… there is at the very least a hypocrisy, if not a fundamental contradiction,” he said.
ADVERTISING“What is the democratic legitimacy of Mario Draghi to write a report like that… did you choose it, or anyone?” Aubry asked.
