Former banker and former member of the College of the Autorité des marchés financiers, Jean-Michel Naulot is the author of
Avoid Collapse
(Seuil, 2017).
The European recovery plan is broken.
Three countries of the European Union, Poland, Hungary and Slovenia, are indeed opposed to the toughening of provisions on respect for the rule of law.
Strange situation where we see the European Parliament violating the law in the name of the rule of law!
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By threatening not to vote on the multiannual budget if it does not obtain satisfaction on the strict conditionality of aid, Parliament is in effect hijacking Union law.
He is caught in the act of abuse of rights.
When aid is provided to a State due to difficulties linked to an exceptional event, Article 122 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) provides that “
the President of the Council shall inform the European Parliament of the decision taken
".
Nowhere is there a question of an agreement by Parliament.
When it comes to respect for treaties, the Commission itself sets a very bad example.
Nothing authorizes him to borrow the 750 billion euros.
Article 5 of the Treaty on European Union (TEU) indeed states that competences within the Union are conferred competences: "
Any competence not attributed to the Union in the Treaties belongs to the Member States
" .
We are therefore in full illegality, on the side of the Commission as of Parliament
No article of the Treaties gives the Commission the right to borrow.
Two articles even explicitly prohibit recourse to borrowing (art. 310 and 311 TFEU): "
The budget must be balanced in terms of income and expenditure
".
The Commission itself recalled in its introduction to the budget, in November 2019, "
that recourse to borrowing to cover a possible budget deficit is not compatible with the system of own resources and is therefore not authorized
".
For only defense, analysts close to the Commission argue that the fact that the loan will be subject to the unanimous agreement of the States and the vote of the national parliaments.
This would constitute a "
quasi-treaty
"!
An interesting legal innovation ... To reassure investors, the Commission for its part invokes Article 323 of the TFEU which states that "
the European Parliament, the Council and the Commission shall ensure the availability of financial means enabling the Union to fulfill its legal obligations towards third parties
”…
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We are therefore in full illegality, on the side of the Commission as well as of Parliament.
Which does not seem, so far, to shock anyone!
At a time when the European loan comes up against the veto of certain Member States, this allows at least to question its advisability.
The loan has three major drawbacks: it is not financed, it is extremely administrative, it hurts most states because of its economic and political conditionality.
Seen from Paris and Berlin, its great advantage is the federal advance (pooled debt and management of all files by the Commission).
But, is it appropriate to take advantage of the pandemic crisis to achieve this hidden goal?
There remains one solution: avoid the detour by the big loan and set up financial transfers for the benefit of the states most affected by the pandemic
To get out of the impasse, there remains a solution: avoid the detour by the big loan and set up financial transfers for the benefit of the States most affected by the pandemic.
This would not prevent continuing to work on increasing the Union's resources (carbon tax at borders and digital tax in particular) and thus revising the multiannual budget upwards once an agreement has been reached.
Direct state-to-state aid is authorized by article 122 mentioned above.
The least indebted states in the EU and those least affected by the pandemic would thus provide aid to the most indebted and most affected states.
It would be fair compensation for the fact that the introduction of the euro has benefited them for twenty years since it is the States which traditionally had a strong currency and for which the euro is today an undervalued currency.
These subsidies would be invested directly, in the coming months, in the hospital sector which has suffered so much.
What better image of solidarity could Europe give?
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Why Poland and Hungary oppose the European recovery plan
This conception of solidarity would be the opposite of the one we are currently being offered: neither federalism, nor bureaucracy, nor conditionality of aid, nor headlong rush with an unfunded loan, but immediate aid geared towards the States and the sectors that need it most.
A solidarity that would not be a sham.