“I’m relatively confident that we can bridge the differences.” Commissioner Gentiloni tells POLITICO. The European Commission’s proposal to reform government spending rules is only a few hours old yet it's already been met with a chorus of complaints.
The European Commission’s proposal to reform government spending rules is only a few hours old yet it's already been met with a chorus of complaints.
For Germany it is too soft, despite having won some concessions. Governments in the EU's south complain it is too strict. Others think Berlin has been listened to too much.
For it's part, the Commission reckons it's well balanced.
What’s clear is it’s going to be fiendishly difficult to get an agreement between all 27 EU countries before Europeans go to the polls in about a year's time.
No one is happy. But then again, that was expected.
“If I told you that we were expecting something really easy and that it was going to be a walk in the park, you wouldn't believe me, right?” a French official said, speaking on condition of anonymity in line with policy.
The proposed reform of the Stability and Growth Pact aims to give EU countries more leeway in determining the pace at which they must reduce debt to below 60 percent of their GDP, and keep annual deficits to below 3 percent.
It does so by setting country-specific debt reduction paths over a number of years in negotiations between the Commission and European capitals — supplanting a stricter but seldom applied rule requiring all countries with excess debt to slash it by 5 percent per year.
“We need fiscal rules that are fit for the challenges of this decade. The new rules will help reduce high public debt levels in a realistic, gradual and sustained manner,” Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said in a statement.
Germany and a number of other countries, afraid that capitals will cut bilateral deals with Brussels, asked for stricter universal rules....
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