This year's annual EPP summit has a particular significance as 16 of the 27 EU countries are now led by centre-right governments, including heavyweights France and Germany.
With an EU summit opening in Brussels tonight, the meeting could go a long way towards shaping an agreement among the 27 European leaders on reforming the eurozone.
A resolution adopted by EPP delegates during the first day of the annual congress on Wednesday (7 December), appears to go in that direction, comforting the Franco-German duo in their push for tighter fiscal surveillance on eurozone budgets.
“The EPP is strongly in favour of better surveillance and economic coordination in the EU. The implementation of a reinforced Stability and Growth Pact (SGP) should include automatic sanctions and stronger independent surveillance mechanisms of macroeconomic imbalances,” reads the statement.
The text mirrors the demands made earlier this week by German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy who called for “automatic sanctions” on countries that break deficit limits, and proposed enshrining those into a revised treaty.
Divergences surface
The Franco-German duo will have time to test their proposals with the other EU heads of state at the EPP summit in Marseille, including Sweden’s Frederik Reinfeldt, Poland’s Donald Tusk and Portugal’s Pedro Passos Coelho.
The conclusions of the EU summit tomorrow are indeed likely to borrow heavily from the EPP text and the Merkel-Sarkozy letter.
But divergences are never far from the surface as other EPP figures called for the treaty revision process to go ahead democratically rather than behind closed doors.
“A new convention would be a way to better explain to our citizens what we are doing to face the crisis,” said Jerzy Buzek, president of the EU Parliament.
“It is important to take important decisions all together. We should do that together,” underlined Angelino Alfano, leader of the Italian center-right party. Despite being the EPP's biggest party, Italy’s Popolo della Libertà – the grouping of ex-Prime Minsiter Silvio Berlsuconi – has often been sidelined by the Franco-German duopoly.
Another divisive issue concerned the European Commission proposal for a financial transactions tax (FTT). “We support the introduction of a financial transaction tax, as a tool to discourage speculative financial activities and enable the financial sector to contribute to overcoming the economic crisis in Europe,” reads an amendment to the final resolution adopted by a large majority of the 813 EPP delegates present in Marseille.
However, an important group of delegates voted against the motion, and a Swedish delegate openly opposed the amendment.
Arab spring and Ukraine
In contrast, discussions on foreign affairs were more consensual. The EPP congress reserved ample time to discuss the Arab Spring and the consequences of the uprising in the southern Mediterranean.
Shared views and backslapping gave way to emotions when the daughter of former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoschenko went on stage and spoke of the detention conditions of her mother, who has been in jail since October on charges of abusing office over a controversial gas deal signed with Russia in 2009.
“My mother’s health is now critical. Even the priest cannot see her. She’s suffering tortures. I’m scared that this torture will continue until it will kill her,” Eugenia Carr-Tymoshenko said.
