THE VIEW OF ANTONIO VITORINO, JACQUES DELORS INSTITUTE

António Vitorino, a Portuguese lawyer by profession since 1982, has been an associate at the law firm Cuatrecasas,Gonçalves Pereira & Associados since 2005. Elected to parliament in 1980, he was Minister for Parliamentary Affairs in the government of Mario Soares (1983-85), then Deputy Secretary in the government of Macau (1986-87). He was a judge on Portugal's constitutional court (1989-94) before being elected MEP in 1994. In 1995 he became Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister of Portugal. In 1999 António Vitorino was appointed European Commissioner for Justice and Internal Affairs, a post he occupied until 2004. As a representative of the European Commission he took part in both the convention which drew up the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights and the Convention on the Future of Europe. Antonio Vitorino is the President of the Jacques Delors Institute.

"Growth forecasts for the euro area over the next few years are weak. Given this economic context, it is going to be difficult to overcome the social difficulties afflicting the EU today, with unemployment topping the list. Thus strengthening growth prospects must be European action’s primary goal.

In this light, we note that the analysis of what needs to be done is more or less the same throughout Europe today. It entails boosting investment, adopting the kind of structural reforms that will make it possible to modernise our economies, and curtailing or slashing public indebtment. In fact, those are the three priori­ties outlined by the Commission in its annual growth survey for 2015. But while agreement on these goals is fairly universal today, what differs is the priority to each one. If every player in this debate con­tinues to pick and choose whatever he likes best and to discard what suits him least, it is not going to be pos­sible to achieve a comprehensive agreement.

What the EU needs today is a “New Deal” in which a balance is found between the different measures. But that agreement cannot rest on a distribution of tasks among the countries whereby some countries would invest more while others would adopt reforms. That is not the right approach. While priority over the past five years has been afforded to bringing down pub­lic debts and deficits, the Juncker Commission, which wishes to impart a fresh boost to Europe, has placed strengthening investment at the top of the European agenda by announcing an investment plan worth € 315 billion. But while this “Juncker Plan” is of course very welcome, doubts still persist regarding the lev­erage effect expected of it, which seems too optimis­tic, and regarding the risk of the projects funded being insufficiently viable. Thus Member States must agree to pump fresh money into the plan in order to attract private capital and to thus tackle the terrible dearth of investments from which Europe is suffering. For exam­ple, Germany, Spain, France and Italy have already announced that they will co-finance projects imple­mented within the framework of the Juncker Plan. All EU member states should do the same.

But while investment must be a priority in the EU today, the EU must not neglect its chief lever for stimu­lating growth in Europe, namely a deepening of the single market. The EU must lift the regulatory and non-regulatory obstacles hampering such sectors as energy, telecommunications, transportation, the digi­tal economy and the single market for services.

And lastly, while budgetary consolidation must be pursued, it cannot represent the beginning and the end of the European Union’s efforts. Europe’s leaders must therefore establish, as their common priority, a strengthening of fiscal justice by committing to the struggle against tax optimisation, tax fraud and tax evasion in Europe. They must also establish a credible strategy for reducing competitive imbalances between Member States within the framework of improved eco­nomic policy coordination among euro area countries."