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The decision taken by Ecofin, the council of the economic and financial ministers of the Union, on 25 November, to avoid procedures and sanctions against France and Germany for excessive public deficit, continues to pose questions and raise doubts about the future of the “Stability Pact”, and also to give rise to serious concerns about the possible repercussions it might have on the work of the intergovernmental Conference that is due to close on 12/13 December. The decision of the ministers, which has aroused the reaction of the Commission in Brussels and the protests of the more ‘virtuous’ countries in terms of their tighter controls on state budgets, is explicable from a political point of view: France and Germany are the two giants, together with Great Britain, of the continental economy. But from a legal point of view, it represents a bending of the rules that the countries of the euro-area adopted with the aim of protecting the stability of the new currency and protecting their economies from inflation and heavy public debt. Such a decision has undoubtedly damaged the credibility of the Commission, which plays the role of ‘guardian of the Treaties’ within the EU. With Ecofin’s rebuff to the executive, as some international commentators write in the main European dailies, the ‘small’ member countries are given the chance to denounce the arrogance of their ‘big’ brothers. Some of these ‘small’ member states have in fact consented to onerous sacrifices to respect the famous Maastricht criteria and join the single currency. Even more serious seems the signal sent out by the Ecofin decision, which places in discussion rules that by common consent were signed by the Union’s ‘members’. Moments of difficulty have often been registered in the history of European integration, and this latest episode must not reduce political commitment to the consolidation and growth of European unity. In stressing that pacts are to be observed by everyone and at all times, there are those who are asking whether the Commission did all in its power to avoid a split that was on the cards by seeking a compromise between the wishes of States and the just need to maintain the general framework of the Stability Pact. The conflict between national interests and Community horizons has thus re-emerged after 25 November: a negative and perhaps not casual coincidence with the drafting of the Constitution and on the eve of the enlargement of the EU. At this point, two problems are posed: the Stability Pact has a need for some adjustment and Europe has a need for common and coherent economic and financial policy guidelines, especially for those countries that have decided to adopt the same currency: a currency whose value transcends that dictated by stock exchanges and markets. Sir
