Goals on Growth

BERLIN In a recently published communication, the heads of government of Germany, France and Great Britain blatantly demand that all EU members subordinate their national economies to the requirements of the core powers. To control this radical economic concentration, the ,,appointment"of a vice president to the EU commission is deemed necessary. Berlin wants to fill this position.

18/2/2004

Gemeinsamer Brief von Bundeskanzler Gerhard Schroeder, Praesident Jacques Chirac und Premierminister Tony Blair an den Praesidenten des Europaeischen Rates, Ministerpraesident Bertie Ahern, und den Praesidenten der Europaeischen Kommission, Romano Prodi

Dear Taoiseach,
Dear President,

Europe has set itself the goal of becoming the world's most dynamic economic region by the end of the decade. It has made significant progress via the Lisbon Process and is poised to enjoy the vast economic potential of EU enlargement. (...)

At present, in the context of demographic slowdown growth and productivity in Europe remain too weak (...).

Member States now need to focus on the key issues of innovation as a force to promote enterprise and the reform of product and labour markets. A further priority has to be modernising the European Social Model characterized by the workforce broadly sharing in the values and decisions of our societies, according to national traditions. A more innovative and employment-intensive economy will help us preserve our social protection systems for future generations. At the same time these systems need comprehensive reform to guarantee their long-term affordability, given the demographic trend.

(...) The European Growth Initiative adopted in December has to be geared more to industrial R&D projects focussed on key growth technologies such as life sciences, nano technologies, communications technologies, energy technologies and environmental technologies. In this framework the EIB has to play a key-role. Europe should also continue to participate in projects such as ITER or space systems research. Investment in R&D is only one part of the innovation process. Equally critical to success is the ability of business to transform research initiatives into commercially viable processes and products. In addition, to strengthen the knowledge-based economy, universities and European research centres will have to be encouraged to establish closer links with a view to forming high-level poles of education and research capable of competing at global level.

(...)

In an EU of 25, we need to look to the future, to ensure that we have the best possible mechanism for achieving the EU s goals. The policy we have outlined extends well into the period of the next EU financial framework. It can be financed using 1% of EU GNP as it is essentially a matter of establishing improved framework conditions and more efficient allocation of resources. We welcome the initiative of the Irish and the three subsequent presidencies on the reform of the regulatory framework in Europe as a means of achieving our goals on growth.

Similarly, as a means of helping achieve our goals on growth, we call for the appointment of a Vice-President of the Commission to focus exclusively on economic reform. This person would push ahead with the Lisbon Agenda and coordinate the work of Commissioners whose portfolios are particularly important for its realization. The Vice-President should have a voice in all decisions on EU projects which impact on the targets of the Lisbon Agenda.

We hope that the European Council will take up our approach of setting clear priorities to achieve the Lisbon targets including those of sustainable development. Growth remains the key to achieving our goals for a dynamic, employment-rich and thus social Europe. We invite the members of the European Council to submit further proposals with this in mind on 25-26 March 2004. Our Ministers, who have further outlined our ideas in three working papers, will feed our proposals into the relevant specialized Councils.

We are sending a copy of this letter to our colleagues in the European Council and to the Heads of Government of the ten new Member States.

Yours sincerely,

Gerhard Schröder
Jacques Chirac
Tony Blair

Source:
Gemeinsamer Brief von Bundeskanzler Gerhard Schroeder, Praesident Jacques Chirac und Premierminister Tony Blair an den Praesidenten des Europaeischen Rates, Ministerpraesident Bertie Ahern, und den Praesidenten der Europäischen Kommission, Romano Prodi


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