Which concrete answers?

“Europe 2020” and the follow-up of the Copenhagen Climate Conference on Climate Change are the two main items on the agenda of the heads of government and state summit of March 25-26 (in Brussels) called by the ‘permanent’ president of the European Council Herman van Rompuy, his first EU27 summit in these capacities. As customary before the summit, diplomacies are preparing for the debates and decisions, which the respective political leaders are called to address. But the problem of Greece’s solvability hovers upon next week’s meeting, and questions are being raised on “Europe 2020” performance, especially as relates to environmental protection, given the poor results achieved with the past meeting held in Denmark’s capital. Less words, more facts. “The president of the European Council – states the draft-program of the end-of-March meeting – intends to limit the working agenda to the items due to be addressed” by EU leaders. Namely: it’s useless to insert many bullet-points in the program if the time devoted to the event will be just enough to address only some of the envisaged topics (summits usually last no longer than a day’s work, plus official dinners, press conferences and bilateral meetings…). Van Rompuy pointed out: “the European Council is expected to obtain an agreement on the general framework for the Union’s new growth and employment strategy, based on the European Commission’s 2009 communication on Europe 2020”. It is thus expected to “provide an opinion on a limited number of quantitative objectives” due to be developed into “differentiated national objectives”. In this framework the Council “will keep a close eye on ongoing efforts by the European Union and its Member States to tackle the current economic crisis”. The Council president underlined the importance of aspects linked to financial supervision and regulation. To this regard the Council will hold a preliminary discussion on the preparation of the G20 summit. The situation of Athens is still of primary importance, along with the proposal of establishing a European Monetary Fund for depressed euro-zone Countries. Discussions on the follow-up to the Copenhagen Conference on Climate Change will focus on “the dynamics of the negotiating process at international level”.The contribution of the European Parliament. The EP contributed to the debate on “Europe 2020”, due to replace the Lisbon Strategy. During the last plenary MEPs adopted a resolution calling for “an ambitious approach” to the crisis by means of “improved coordination of national economic policies”, along with sanctions and incentives to ensure the implementation of EU2020. Investments in training, learning and applied research are encouraged, for the development of sustainable economy and quality jobs. Indeed, these words have often been heard across EU institutions. MEPs requested the implementation of measures in support of euro-currency stability, financial supervision, single market expansion and SMEs. The EP reiterated the need to “promote formation”, “to reform social security schemes” and to “step up workers’ and retirement-age flexibility”.Coordinating economic policies. “European governance must be strengthened in the framework of the new ‘Europe 2020’ framework”. The leaders of the three largest political groups in the European Parliament – EPP, Socialists and Democrats, Liberal-democrats – submitted a common resolution underlining crisis exit strongholds and examples of financial unbalances. In presenting the joint resolution later adopted with MEP majority-vote, Joseph Daul, Martin Schulz and Guy Verhofstadt pointed out that “the Lisbon strategy failed due to a lack of commitment and ownership by Member States”. The three MEPs called upon the European Council to abandon the ‘open coordination method’ based on peer pressure in the field of economic policy in favor of stronger instruments. Daul, Schulz and Verhofstadt called on the European Commission “to utilize all the relevant legal bases in the new Treaty to improve economic coordination and oversee the implementation of national action plans”. The three political groups called for the creation of a social market economy characterized by “sustainable and quality jobs”, support to SMEs and research promotion. The resolution stressed the need “to improve economic coordination and oversee the implementation of national action plans”, in view of single market fulfillment, balanced growth, whilst providing employment in the framework of a “green” economy.