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Conservative MEP Leader Challenges Blair on EU Economic Reform<
March 23, 2005
Responding to the announcement from the EU Summit overnight that President Chirac has persuaded his fellow leaders to "water down" the Services Directive, Timothy Kirkhope MEP, Leader of the Conservatives in the European Parliament, said:
"This Summit was supposed to be about kick-starting the Lisbon economic reform process. The news overnight from Brussels is that the French are claiming victory on watering down the Services Directive - an ominous sign that at the first hurdle there has been a collective failure of nerve.
Conservative MEPs have always been in the vanguard of pushing for a more free market Europe with less red tape and protectionism. We have fought for deregulation and the opening of markets to benefit British business. Sadly, it now appears that Mr Blair has buckled under the weight of a French onslaught against liberalisation in Europe. Only last week his Europe Minister, Denis MacShane, said 'But now there are powerful voices arguing that efforts to open up the dynamism of Europe's service industries should be slowed down or shelved. We need to take on this new, insidious form of protectionism'. Once again, all talk from Labour.
This Summit was supposed to put Europe on a new path of growth and prosperity. Instead, all the talk has been of protecting the so-called European 'social model'. It is precisely this model that keeps millions of French and Germans on the unemployment registers. The time for action to replace it with a free market, enterprise-driven agenda is now.
Diluting the Services Directive in the way reported today sends all the wrong messages to business. Mr Blair has been saddling British business with higher levels of European and home-grown regulation over the past seven years. As today's Summit concludes, British business is right to ask the question Is Tony Blair more interested in helping Mr Chirac win his referendum on the EU Constitution or opening up new markets for British business?"
ENDS
