More open and competitive markets must be the long term answer
Malcolm Harbour
EU leaders meeting in Brussels have been urged to cultivate "more open markets" in order to revive Europe's competitiveness and prevent another economic downturn.
The demand, from senior UK deputy Malcolm Harbour, comes as EU leaders and heads of state defied a national strike in Belgium on Monday to press ahead with the one-day summit, which is part of continuing attempts to resolve the economic crisis.
At the summit, European leaders will be looking to forge closer economic ties between member states by agreeing the details of a treaty imposing strict rules on government spending.
They are also trying to agree the details of a permanent eurozone bailout fund, the European financial stability mechanism, to deal with sovereign debt crises in the future.
Speaking ahead of the meeting, ECR leader Martin Callanan said, "The EU faces two crises: a sovereign debt crisis and a crisis of competitiveness.
"Instead of discussing treaties or new powers for EU institutions we need to funnel all of our energy on jump-starting economic growth and making the whole EU more competitive in a fierce global world. Europe will be left behind if we do not act immediately and with ambition.
"The UK premier David Cameron is right to point out the fundamental weakness of the eurozone, which is the divergence of northern and southern European economies. The strait jacket of the euro has exacerbated that divergence."
His party colleague Malcolm Harbour, who is chairman of parliament's internal market committee, said, "The previous EU summit called for the completion of all the single market act proposals by the end of 2012. The SMA is the centrepiece of the European growth agenda and the ECR was pivotal in getting it approved.
"Whatever the short term answers to this crisis, more open and competitive markets must be the long term answer. A commitment to increasing competitiveness and opening markets will go a long way towards inspiring some confidence in the markets that we will come through the storm."
Elsewhere, the Brussels-based Party of European Socialists (PES) called on EU leaders gathering in strike-hit Brussels to produce a "genuine European action" to tackle a youth unemployment "crisis", saying this should be "one of the main conclusions" of the summit.
The party has also heavily criticised what it says are "empty proposals" on the topic by German chancellor Angela Merkel and French president Nicolas Sarkozy.
PES president Sergei Stanishev said that PES has come up with "a detailed plan to tackle youth unemployment" after a year of high-level political consultation.
He said, "Youth unemployment costs the EU €2bn per week.
"A Europe-wide youth guarantee should be introduced, ensuring that every young person in Europe must be offered a job, further education or work-focused training, at the latest four months after leaving education or after becoming unemployed.
The EU must invest the necessary funds to lift at least two million young people out of unemployment by the end of 2014."
He contrasted this with the proposals by Merkel and Sarkozy, which he said made "vague and non-committal references to youth unemployment".
Stanishev added, "European people are not stupid."
"They have seen French and German leaders expend enormous political capital to create a harsh "austerity" treaty.
"No one is fooled by this last minute, hastily drafted, "Merkozy" paper on youth unemployment, which neither foresees investments into young people, nor concrete legislation.
"This paper is just 'mood music' designed to distract people from their harsh agenda of cuts, deregulation and liberalisation."
Meanwhile, the American Chamber of Commerce to the EU (AmCham EU) has issued the summit with a list of five key measures it believes are needed to put Europe back on a path of sustainable growth.
Its chairman Hendrik Bourgeois, said, "The economic and financial crisis gripping Europe is entering a critical phase requiring bold action and strong leadership.
"Austerity measures alone are not going to get Europe out of this crisis. We need to put in place mechanisms that are going to spur employment, encourage business investment and drive the necessary economic reforms to ensure Europe remains a player in the global economy."
Further pre-summit comment came from Andrea Benassi, secretary general of Brussels-based Ueapme, which represents SMEs, who said, "The implementation in the EU of the 'Basel III' rules on capital requirements is a source of concern, as it risks jeopardising the provision of financing to the real economy.
"We believe that corrective measures must be put in place in the new EU rules for capital requirements currently under discussion.
"In particular, the review suggested by the commission on risk weights for SME loans should take place immediately, rather than after two years as proposed.
"In fact, the current weights combined with higher capital requirements would make financing more expensive for SMEs and harder to get for riskier-than-average business ventures.
"Revising the risk weights after two years would be too late, as the market for SME loans would have dried up by then."
