Activities of Mojca KLEVA KEKUŠ related to 2013/2134(INI)
Plenary speeches (1)
European Semester for economic policy coordination (debate)
Amendments (19)
Amendment 1 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 1
Paragraph 1
1. Welcomes the 2013 Country-specific Recommendations (CSR) and especially their focus on ambitious measures to reignite growth, tackle unemployment and create jobs and enhance the competitiveness of EU economies; notes with concern that under the persistent pressure of the economic, social, financial and sovereign debt crisis, the CSR on the whole are not ambitious enough; in light of this, points out at the lack of recommendations to restore urgently needed lending to the real economy and SMEs, strengthening of the link between public and private investment capacities, fighting tax fraud and addressing the social dimension of EMU;
Amendment 2 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 1 a (new)
Paragraph 1 a (new)
1a. Reiterates the position of the European Parliament on the need to strengthen the democratic legitimacy of the process of the European Semester; stresses the fact that National Parliaments, and regional and local authorities, have very limited access to the process of the European Semester and their role is practically ignored within the CSR, despite the fact that their contribution and participation are necessary if the chances of meeting the Europe 2020 targets are to be improved;
Amendment 4 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 2
Paragraph 2
2. Reiterates the importance of Cohesion Policy as the main investment instrument, playing a central role in combating the crisis, reducing regional disparities and engaging the EU and its regions on a path of sustainable growth; Hence underlines the importance of securing adequate budgetary provisions in the context of the MFF negotiations to the European Union Structural and Investment Funds, noting in particular their key share of investment in a range of areas such as employment, innovation, sustainable development and support to SMEs;
Amendment 4 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 1 a (new)
Paragraph 1 a (new)
1a. Points out that austerity measures that seek to reduce public deficits by cutting public sector jobs and welfare services have a bigger impact on women than on men; observes that the introduction of austerity measures significantly increased long-term unemployment among women; stresses that fiscal tightening should not jeopardise the progress achieved by policies promoting gender equality;
Amendment 5 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 3
Paragraph 3
3. Is strongly concerned by the sharp downfall in public and private investment in the productive economy and especially at the local and regional level; Is of the opinion that decisive measures are needed to reform product and labour markets, adopt cautious wage policies and base the future growth model on innovation, and shift production towardstowards green low-carbon economy and high value-added activities; Expresses its firm belief that the Structural and Investment Funds are essential in order to further strengthen as well as prevent and mitigate any shortfall in the aforementioned respects;
Amendment 8 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 3 a (new)
Paragraph 3 a (new)
3a. Points out that, at a time of heavy fiscal constraint and reduced lending capacity in the private sector, the EU Structural and Investment Funds, represent an essential lever for stimulating the economy, especially through the use of innovative financial instruments; believes that an increased use of innovative financial instruments within Cohesion Policy can foster public- private partnerships, achieve a multiplier effect with the EU budget, guarantee an important financing stream for strategic regional investment and raise EU growth potential; in this regard, welcomes the important role that the new innovative financial instruments will play within Cohesion policy in the programming period 2014-2020; urges the Commission to give financial instruments also a clearer position within the CSR and strengthen the alignment of the European Structural and Investment Funds with the EIB programmes, particularly in the area of loan guarantees for SMEs and microenterprises;
Amendment 8 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 4 a (new)
Paragraph 4 a (new)
4a. Stresses that Member States should improve the percentage of children or young adults in educational systems and put more focus on the problem of early school leaving, especially by collecting information on the main reasons for early school leaving in order to adopt and implement policies for its prevention;
Amendment 10 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 3 b (new)
Paragraph 3 b (new)
3b. Notes with concern that the financing of the productive economy, especially SMEs, has not been restored across the whole EU, with the less developed regions taking the worst hit; points out that increasing differences in access to credit can further deepen regional divergences; hence underlines the importance of the European Structural and Investment Funds ability to link public and private investment and deliver alternative sources of financing for SMEs; calls on the Commission to guarantee, in a timely manner and before the start of the programming period 2014-2020, legal clarity and transparency around the usage of the off-the-shelf innovative financial instruments;
Amendment 11 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 4
Paragraph 4
4. Believes that whereas financial protection measures enacted by the ECB have contributed to the stability of the euro area and calmed financial markets, the competitiveness problem in the euro area has been left unresolved;
Amendment 11 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 5
Paragraph 5
5. Calls on the Commission, in its upcoming Annual Growth Survey, to raise the issue of specific policy guidelines on reducing gender inequalities, including, in particular, guidelines on closing the gender pay gap and the gender pension gap which often results in women finding themselves below the poverty line at a later stage of their lives, on increasing the participation of women in the labour market and on combating gender segregation in the labour market as the future economic prosperity of the EU depends crucially on its ability to fully utilise its labour resources;
Amendment 12 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 5 a (new)
Paragraph 5 a (new)
5a. Calls on the Commission to include the European Semester as one of the Europe 2020 subtargets in order to fight against youth unemployment and poverty;
Amendment 13 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 5
Paragraph 5
5. Welcomes the labour market reforms which were aimed at improving the resilience of the labour market, introducing more internal and external flexibility, reducing fragmentation and facilitating transition between jobs; Recalls however that further and more in-depth reforms are needed, notably to improve labour market mobility and especially youth mobility with; in this regard and connected to the alarming figures of youth unemployment in Europe, calls on the Commission to put a special focus on improving the professional opportunities of young people, in particular of those who face difficulties when entering the job market, to provide job- search assistance and to establish clear and transparent links between education and training in order to achieve a better match between skills and available jobs;
Amendment 14 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 6 a (new)
Paragraph 6 a (new)
6a. Points out the importance of gender budgeting with the aim to examine all government programmes and policies, their effects on resource allocation and their contribution to equality between women and men;
Amendment 20 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 7 a (new)
Paragraph 7 a (new)
7a. Recalls the European Parliament's position against the proposed macroeconomic conditionality in the framework of the MFF negotiations to the European Union Structural and Investment Funds as this would, without any relation between policy performance at regional and Member State level, punish regions for possible failure of compliance with economic governance procedures at national level;
Amendment 21 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 7 b (new)
Paragraph 7 b (new)
7b. Calls on the Commission to complete the EMU by delivering legislative proposals linked to the social pillar; stresses that a social scoreboard that would serve as a building block of this pillar needs to include also relevant regional and local specificities;
Amendment 121 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 11
Paragraph 11
11. Welcomes the use by the Commission of the margin of manoeuvre offered by the revised SGP to extend the deadlines for the correction of excessive deficits in seven procedures; calls on the Commission and the Council to ensure that the content and the calendar of the fiscal adjustment path are adapted to the specificity of each country and, particularly in ‘deficit’ countries, include the aforementioned margin of manoeuvre and the full use of structural fEuropean Structural and Investment Funds, sound and sustainable structural reforms and the identification of investments (namely in the CSR) essential to boost competitiveness; calls on the Commission to clarify as a matter of urgency the ways in which to accommodate, under certain conditions, non-recurrent, public investment programmes with a proven impact on the sustainability of public finances;
Amendment 170 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 17
Paragraph 17
17. Stresses that the financing of the real economy, and of SMEs in particular, has not been restored on the EU's periphery; points out that major differences in access to credit further stimulate the growing internal divergence trends in the EU and euro area in particular and destroy the internal market through unfair competition conditions; points out also that negative economic prospects only partially justify such restrictive credit constraints; calls for closer monitoring of the banking sector practices in financing the real economy, in particular economically viable SMEs; calls foracknowledges in this regard the important role that the new innovative financial instruments in the Cohesion Policy can play in fostering public and private investment and urges the Commission to guarantee legal clarity and transparency of implementation around new financial instruments in a timely manner and before the start of the programming period 2014-2020; calls on the Commission to prioritise work on alternative sources of financing for SMEs, in particular through the structural fEuropean Structural and Investment Funds, the European Investment Bank, the European Investment Fund and public development banks;
Amendment 202 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 20
Paragraph 20
20. Welcomes the Commission's ‘Action Plan to strengthen the fight against tax fraud and tax evasion’ and its recommendations on ‘measures intended to encourage third countries to apply minimum standards of good governance in tax matters’ and on ‘aggressive tax planning’, adopted on 6 December 2012; stresses that fairness and justice in burden sharing require a completely new approach to tax fraud and evasion; calls for urgent action by the Commission and for clear support from the Council on these dossiers; recalls the Parliaments resolution on the fight against tax fraud, tax evasion and tax havens of 21 of May 2013 that identified further necessary actions to be taken in the field of tax fraud, aggressive tax planning and tax havens; stresses that fairness and justice in burden sharing require a completely new approach to tax fraud and evasion; calls for urgent action and comprehensive strategy, based on concrete legislative actions by the Commission to close the EU tax gap and for clear support from the Council on all blocked or pending dossiers related to taxation;
Amendment 211 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 21
Paragraph 21
21. Calls on the Council to conclude the negotiations for the Financial Transaction Tax and to include in its agenda, as a matter of urgency, theactions to close the tax gap, tackle tax havens and work on convergence of tax systems within the EU;