Barroso backs Kok report

Incoming Commission President Barroso has presented
European leaders with the Kok report and further ideas on
kick-starting the Lisbon agenda. However, the Council will
not present specific conclusions before the Spring
Summit.

Incoming Commission President Barroso presented the report of
the High Level Expert Group chaired by Wim Kok on the review of the
Lisbon agenda, saying that it was a “realistic, but worrying,
assessment of the progress. It shows that we must act now to make
up for lost time”. However, he was still optimistic that the Lisbon
goals remain within reach. 

Mr Barroso emphasised the Commission’s prioritites for the
mid-term review. First and foremost, he agreed with the Kok report
that better ownership is needed, thereby backing the ‘naming and
shaming’ approach taken by the group. Some countries are said
to be reluctant to go along with this suggestion. Council
President Balkenende said that “we need better instruments to
ensure better implementation. We will draw the final conclusions on
this in March”.

Mr Barroso also announced that the Commission was going to
include in the mid-term review an analysis of the “huge economic,
social and environmental costs of letting Europe stagnate – the
real costs of non-Lisbon”.

Moreover, Mr Barroso pointed to the need to refocus the Lisbon
agenda by cutting it down from the current 120 actions and
priorities. As a third priority, he wants to improve the way in
which reform efforts are organised, partly through the Lisbon
Strategy group of Commissioners which he will chair.

Further ideas of the future Commission president include a “Mr
Lisbon” in each national capital, national action plans (as
outlined in the Kok report) and a single Council formation to
co-ordinate the implementation.

The most important issue the Council has to decide on concerns
the strong focus the Kok report puts on growth and jobs. “Is it
right to suggest that pursuing this goal can successfully embed
social and environmental objectives?” Barroso asked
the European Council, saying that he needed a clear
mandate to take the mid-term review forward.

In their conclusions, heads of state and
government responded rather vaguely to the findings and
suggestions of the Kok report, but they
did give Barroso the mandate “to make the
implementation of the Lisbon Strategy a key component of the
Commission’s policy.”

The European Council invited the Commission to present its
proposals for the mid-term review by the end of January 2005,
taking into account not only the Kok report, but also the
views of Member States and the forthcoming review of the
Sustainable Development Strategy. These proposals will then be
discussed at the Spring Summit meeting in March 2005.

The Council also welcomed the institutions’ efforts to develop a
common methodology for impact assessment in order to drive forward
the initiative on better regulation to avoid unnecessary
administrative burdens on business. 

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