European Economic and Social Committee

The President

Staffan Nilsson's Intervention before EC President Barroso takes the floor

in the EESC plenary

22.02.2012 EESC

  • Welcome! I would say it is a good moment, at the beginning of the year, for us to share our views with you, and for you to share with us the Commission's priorities and the Commission's needs in terms of the advice we can give.
  • Let me briefly present to you a few highlights of our work, on behalf of the members gathered here.

CRISIS

  • On a general note, I feel that we need to use less the word crisis and more the word "potential". However yes, the critical situation we are in is more than about economic aspects, it is about social, political and confidence.
  • I feel to say it again and again that we need structural reforms with long-term effect. We look at this from a non-political perspective, from the civil society perspective.
  • On the crisis,we have asked for leadership and initiative, at the same time we need to go back to the community method – the interaction between Commission, Parliament, etc. The Committee and I are strong supporters of a strong Commission, also in managing the crisis. You may know that we had a joint ECO-SOC 2020 sections and steering committee meeting on 8th December 2011 on the crisis. We are discussing a resolution on the crisis today.
  • We think that austerity measures are necessary, but it is more than about budget and discipline. The management of economic policy in the euro area and in the EU also needs to be more comprehensive and ambitious.
  • We have to couple austerity measures with strong measures dedicated to stimulate growth and jobs, to re- launch the economy. Investments and a real Single Market forSMEs are keys there. And for that we need a strong budget.
  • By the way, some important opinionswill be discussed after your intervention today, opinions with recommendations on how to tackle different aspects of the crisis, on the annual growth survey and on growth. I would like to congratulate the EC for its last annual growth survey; the EESC has seen that there is a better balance between budget cuts and actions dedicated to re-launch EU competitiveness.
  • We will also continue to work on the development of the Single Market with a strong focus on its social dimension, for example by looking into the development of the social business initiative.

EUROPE 2020

  • You know very well that we are mobilized to help make EUROPE 2020 strategy a reality, as well as contributing to the European Semester.
  • On Europe 2020, the EESC believes that this strategy is even more than ever necessary to help Europe recover from the crisis. The EESC insists that we need to keep the perspective of sustainability, the long term strategy, in addition to taking short term measures.
  • This year we continue our work with the national economic and social councils, making sure that they are involved and monitor the progress of implementation in their countries.

Rio+20

  • We are taking a long-termsustainability perspective across all policy areas with each and every opinion we are making on EU policies. I’m talking here about environmental, economic and social sustainability.
  • But we are also looking at the world outside Europe, as we have become more and more interconnected. So we have recently concentrated on some horizontal topics of utmost importance in global affairs: global food security and sustainable development.
  • We have developed through a 1 year long effort of consultations with and coordination among European civil society organisations a position in preparation for the UN global sustainable development summit Rio+20 to be held in June. Following our 7-8 of February 2012 major conference with our European networks, which included the participation of Commissioners Potocnik and Piebalgs and the UN coordinator Lalonde, we now have a common message, adopted today in our Plenary in the form of an EESC additional opinion on Rio+20. We have in this way fulfilled our commitment to you, dearJosé Manuel, tobring together European organisations and networks to secure joints input into Rio+20.
  • We do hope that EU leaders will take our message on board and will negotiate with the other world leaders in an ambitious way. We continue now our dialogue with the external partners from the BRICS countries. We will be present in Rio and want our leaders at Rio+20 summit to commit to a concrete action plan leading to sustainable development and poverty eradication within the limited resources of our planet.
  • We do hope that EU leaders will take our message on board and will negotiate with the other world leaders in an ambitious way. We want our leaders at Rio+20 summit to commit to a concrete action plan leading to sustainable development and poverty eradication within the limited resources of our planet.

PROTOCOL

  • Today it is a special occasion - we will sign the new Protocol with the Commission.
  • With the Lisbon Treaty we must, we can, we are willing to do much more, to continue playing a meaningful role in the EU policy-making process. And this is reflected in our new Protocol.
  • The protocol is a symbol for our good cooperation. The EESC will always be there ready to advise the Commission based on our grassroots expertise whenever you need us.
  • In the last year we have tried to make our work more efficient, being able to take stock more quickly of current needs, adjust our priorities and be flexible in our internal processes and decision-making, while maintaining a good quality of our work.

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For further details:

Coralia Catana | EESC President's Spokesperson | +32 (0)25469963 | +32 (0)498984613

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