EU investment plan: In Europe we trust?

Frans Timmermans, first vice president of the European Commission, was the guest at the second Euranet Plus Big Crunch TV debate entitled “EU INVESTMENT PLAN: IN EUROPE WE TRUST?”

Following up on the successful Big Crunch EU Election Presidential Debate 2014 in April, Euranet Plus once again went beyond the Brussels bubble with a two-part Big Crunch Debate on December 11.

• Broadcast dates:
  • BFM Business TV: December 12 at 8:30 p.m. CET
  • RTBF: December 21 at 7 p.m. CET
  • More broadcasting dates to be announced soon …
• Watch at the top of this dedicated page from December 11 at 7 p.m. CET
  • Recorded at TV set AGORA, 3rd floor, ASP Building, European Parliament, Brussels on December 11, 2014
  • Get the press photos of the debate on Flickr (Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike)
  • Join the event for the debate on Facebook and discuss along
  • Use the hash tag #BigCrunchEU on Twitter and G+ to get the buzz

In part one of the debate, in English, Frans Timmermans faced off with six members of the Euranet Plus network at the European Parliament in Brussels. The moderator was Brian Maguire of the Euranet Plus News Agency. Via satellite or telephone, journalists based in Croatia, Germany, Slovenia, Italy, Greece and Poland asked the first vice president of the European Commission questions on issues ranging from investment funds and better regulation to the investment gap in the euro area.

Part two of the debate, in French, saw Timmermans joined by a top industry executive from France, Marguerite Deprez-Audebert, general director of printing company Léonce Deprez, and Tanja Struve, head of the Brussels office of the German County Association. The discussion focused on the daily challenges faced by French industry and private investors and was hosted by BFM Business and moderated by Yann-Antony Noghès.

Commission’s investment plan ‘absolutely going to work’

Timmermans was more than convinced of European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker’s master investment plan, saying the macroeconomic proposal is “absolutely going to work.” Facing the questions of Euranet Plus partner radio stations during the debate, he revealed his recipe for the successful package: no political interference in the choice of the projects, listening to the needs of the markets and the need of reforms in the member states. It’s a recipe that is not necessarily new and that still remains vague in terms of the concrete implementing process.

Timmermans pointed out it would be most important to focus on the needs of the markets and described the Commission’s approach as “a new way to look at those things.”

“Until now when we talk about investments, we always talk about infrastructural projects, about structural funds, about the EU putting money somewhere, the member states matching the funds. Now we’re looking at the markets, we’re looking at what’s the problem,” he said.

“Don’t get me wrong, this plan will fail if member states don’t reform. So if member states believe this plan is an alternative to reform, they are completely wrong because the markets will punish them. It is not the states that will punish them, it’s the markets.”

No political interference

The leverage that the Commission is counting on for the investment plan to succeed has been criticized as being unrealistic. But here again Timmermans showed optimism, saying that the leverage is based “on the experience of the European Investment Bank.”

As for the choice of the projects, he promised that the Commission will not interfere with the real experts.

“I think it is important that we would leave the choice of the projects up to the experts, and that we would look at what the markets want with little or no political interference,” he said.

“If we apply the traditional logic of the member states saying: ‘I want my money back, I want exactly this much invested in my country,’ then you will get into a process of political interference and not a sound appraisal of the projects. So what we need is a sound economic appraisal of the projects, projects Europe really needs and then I think it will work.”

But the Dutch Social-Democrat stayed vague on details. Who, for instance, will in the end make the choice of the projects that are going enter the programme? “We are still working on that,” Timmermans replied, underlining that it “will be very important to use the experience both of the Commission and the European Investment Bank.”

And when asked how the Commission will guarantee that there will be no political interference, Timmermans just said they needed “a little bit of time to set up a structure.”

Cut down the paperwork

Timmermans said he himself was strongly opposed “to point on specific projects,” referring to the need of avoiding any kind of political interference. In this logic, the commissioner stuck to the general line by pointing out “the need to create a [European] energy union, a sustainable economy and a [EU] digital single market.”

Italian Euranet Plus partner Radio 24 II Sole wanted to know how Timmermans would make sure that investments are efficient and not eaten up by heavy bureaucracy. Timmermans’ recipe was “cutting red tape,” a promise often made by politicians during election campaigns.

So, what concretely does cutting red tape mean to the Dutch commissioner?

“That means that we have to look at the administrative burdens, especially for small and medium-sized enterprises and make sure that people feel that they have less paperwork in one or two years from now, that they have earlier access in Italy to courts when there is a problem, that they get tax rulings much earlier than they have today, that they have VAT [value added tax] forms that are not so complicated with so many questions that they give up,” he said.

“There are very concrete steps we can take in the next couple of years. And I really want to come before you again in a couple of years’ time to be held accountable, whether we have succeeded or not.”

Euranet Plus News Agency web tip

• Presentation of the new investment plan with video by the European Commission

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Euranet Plus: Frans Timmermans in the Big Crunch