European Council: A New Treaty Born
Tuesday 31 January 2012By Anna Vvedenskaya
While the Europeans expect the new Treaty on stability to improve fiscal discipline, raise confidence and enhance growth PM David Cameron expects a wave of the companies and banks from the continent to look for shelter in Great Britain, aspiring liberty and flexibility in operations.
United in Brussels today 25-member states agreed on a new Treaty, that at the moment still has a long and descriptive name, mentioning ‘stability, coordination and governance’- the words reminding of a mantra from frequent use by the EU bureaucrats. Most probably is will never get a short geographic name as a Treaty of Nice, Maastricht, Amsterdam or Lisbon, at least no name of Brussels was suggested to immortalize it.
Undoubtfully the rejection of Great Britain and Czech Republic to joint stripped it to larger extend of the completeness and EU-level integrality to equal the previous ‘big’ Treaties of the past. Although British rejection to join the Treaty comes not from the rejection of the EU but from its vision of as Common Market and was well known in advance, still it brings some bitterness to the taste of German victory which is the major force behind the initiative, leaving the move incomplete.
In spite of rejecting of the Treaty, Great Britain is going to stand further for the integration of the EU market, with the special accent on the competitiveness. The agenda of digital common market is a one to pursue with rigor to sustain Europe’s competition vis-à-vis Asian fast developing economies. Not least the services directive as an integral part of British EU agenda was mentioned. Mr.Cameron repeatedly pointed out on the trade and serviced on-web as a top priority in the economic development of the EU so his government will watch the new Treaty as ‘hawk’ in national interest to prevent undermining the Common Market.
He underlined that that ‘Great Britain is not in the Treaty’, being skeptical over the effects of the fiscal union on economies boost and ironical over the ‘tax Tobin’ or the tax on transactions that was already rejected in the past for its ambivalence; wishing well to his French counterpart Mr.Sarkozy who is the greatest enthusitast of the measure, Mr Cameron casts doubt on ‘tax Tobin’ as a remedy to financial climate, on contrary he presumed that it can be damaging unless implied universally.
There was a grain of salt about the EU institutions, ‘already used in the other settings’ than originally conceived and an necessity to define the framework of its activities precisely. The Germans got what they were up to, including the European stability mechanism to collect the fines for infringements from the member-states which neglect the balanced budget rules.
The 0,1% of GDP to be paid under the Court of Justice orders, and the correction mechanism to be trigged, - all in place to insure the EU economic sanity. Legally binning the Treaty will come in vigor after as minimum as 12 euro area members will ratify it. Today’s agreement will be signed on 1st March.
The galloping speed of implementation will quickly clarify if Mr.Cameron welcomes the continental companies in London soon.