Activities of Miguel VIEGAS related to 2015/2285(INI)
Plenary speeches (1)
European Semester for economic policy coordination: Annual Growth Survey 2016 (A8-0030/2016 - Maria João Rodrigues) PT
Shadow reports (1)
REPORT on the European Semester for economic policy coordination: Annual Growth Survey 2016 PDF (395 KB) DOC (172 KB)
Amendments (43)
Amendment 14 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital A
Recital A
A. whereas economic recovery in the European Union is under way butslight and weak economic growth means that economic recovery in the European Union is far from being consolidated and this recovery remains uneven between and within Member States and is partly driven by temporary factors;
Amendment 26 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital A a (new)
Recital A a (new)
Aa. whereas these so-called temporary factors include a considerable loss of income for workers, in particular through wage cuts, unemployment, the abolition or reduction of social support and the deteriorating state of the health and education sectors as a result of public spending cuts;
Amendment 33 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital B a (new)
Recital B a (new)
Ba. whereas it is imperative to break with the neoliberal principles that have been governing the policies imposed by the EU on the peoples and workers of the Member States, and whereas only sustainable economic growth based on decent wages, on work with rights, on state control of strategic sectors of the economy, on universal and free access to all levels of education, on promotion and socialisation of innovation will make it possible to boost the economy and competitiveness of EU Member States;
Amendment 44 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital D
Recital D
D. whereas the employment rate is improving but not enough to significantly curb unemployment, particularly youth and long-term unemployment, and poverty;
Amendment 51 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital D a (new)
Recital D a (new)
Da. whereas the improvements that have been seen in the employment rate in countries such as Portugal, Spain, Italy and Greece stem from the manipulation of statistical information and a decline in the working age population, owing to a very significant increase in emigration;
Amendment 56 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital D b (new)
Recital D b (new)
Db. whereas the European Semester and related instruments such as the Annual Growth Survey, whose basic objective is to ensure that the Member States institutionalise austerity-based budgetary and economic policies regardless of their constitutional texts and the will of the people, in line with the debt and deficit targets laid down in the Stability and Growth Pact, the economic reform plans set out in their country-specific recommendations and the Europe 2020 Strategy targets for growth and employment, are profoundly neoliberal and antidemocratic in nature;
Amendment 61 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1
Paragraph 1
Amendment 73 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 a (new)
Paragraph 1 a (new)
1a. Does not support the proposals contained in the 2016 Annual Growth Survey package, since overall they continue to emphasise policies which have so far failed to provide answers to the problems facing EU Member States, and have instead exacerbated those problems;
Amendment 75 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 2
Paragraph 2
Amendment 88 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 3
Paragraph 3
3. Notes that Europe’s global competitiveness remains an important objective, while the worsening global outlook calls for strengthening domestic sources of growththe worsening global outlook means that domestic sources of growth need to be strengthened, involving a different combination of policies that will make it possible on the one hand to boost public and private investment, above all with a view to expanding and upgrading infrastructure, production equipment, and production and organisation techniques and methods, and on the other hand to stimulate domestic demand, in particular by restoring the income lost as a result of so-called austerity policies and by implementing a redistributive and progressive tax policy;
Amendment 114 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 5
Paragraph 5
5. Is encouraged by mildworried by insufficient improvements in labour market indicators; calls for more effort to reduce poverty, social exclusion and growing inequalities;
Amendment 120 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 5
Paragraph 5
5. Is encouraged byNotes the mild improvements in labour market indicators; calls, although these are being aided to some extent by manipulation of statistics and the fact that the working population is declining in Portugal, Spain, Italy, Greece, and elsewhere; calls, therefore, for genuine commitment and for more effort to reduce poverty, social exclusion and growing inequalities;
Amendment 124 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 6
Paragraph 6
Amendment 139 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 7
Paragraph 7
7. Calls for the European Fund for Strategic Investments to be used to maximum effect to support higher-risk projects not financed otherwise, and to promote growth, job creation andpublic investment projects, especially in countries most affected by austerity and liquidity constraints at household and business level, and to promote growth, job creation and cohesion; accordingly considers it essential to establish investment patterns meeting the urgent need for greater social and territorial cohesion;
Amendment 156 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9
Paragraph 9
9. Is aware of the ongoing deleveraging process in the private sector; points to the importance of completing the banking union and boosting equity investments in SMEs;
Amendment 170 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9 a (new)
Paragraph 9 a (new)
9a. Maintains that banking supervision has to be brought into the public sphere in order to respond to the financing needs of the real economy and ensure that self- interested speculation strategies do not become the option of choice;
Amendment 177 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 10
Paragraph 10
10. Highlights firstly the importance of investments in human capital andto improve the standard of labour force training and skills, both before the start of working life and for its entire duration, and, secondly, the necessity of other social investments;
Amendment 207 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 11 a (new)
Paragraph 11 a (new)
11a. Condemns the fact that in the structural reforms implemented and proposed to date, the emphasis has been on liberalisation and privatisation of companies still under public control in strategic economic sectors (energy, transport, telecommunications, and banking), on greater labour market flexibility and the destruction of labour rights, and on cuts in public spending on welfare, health, and education, with the corresponding reduction in social rights;
Amendment 209 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 12
Paragraph 12
Amendment 235 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 14
Paragraph 14
14. Urges that further steps be taken towards resilient labour markets, serving to enhance the status of work by guaranteeing jobs with rights, a high standard of working conditions, and stable employment relationships, and with reduced segmentation and sustainable welfare systems with increased focus on social investment;
Amendment 254 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 16
Paragraph 16
16. Calls for a greater shift of taxation away from labourthe tax base to be widened so as to enable taxation to be shared more fairly between labour and capital, the object being also to remedy the present tax inequality between SMEs and big business, and substantially to increase the ratio of direct taxes to indirect taxes within tax systems, thereby making for greater fairness; calls, therefore, for a greater shift of taxation away from labour income towards capital gains and calls for Member States’ tax systems to be made genuinely progressive;
Amendment 258 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 16
Paragraph 16
16. Calls for a greater shift of taxation away from labour towards wealth and economic rents, ensuring an adequate level of corporate taxes;
Amendment 267 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 17
Paragraph 17
Amendment 283 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 18
Paragraph 18
18. Reiterates the need for responsible fiscal policies that will boost economic growth, taking into account debt sustainability, the economic cycle and investment gaps; notes that debt restructuring is necessary in some countries in order to reduce public and private debt to sustainable levels; draws attention to the disastrous effects of austerity policies, through which budget consolidation strategies have compromised public investment, the social functions of the state and economic growth;
Amendment 287 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 19
Paragraph 19
Amendment 289 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 19
Paragraph 19
19. Insists on implementation ofthe urgent need to repeal the Stability and Growth Pact, while making use of available fiscal space, inter alia, to deal with security threats and refugee inflows;
Amendment 318 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 20
Paragraph 20
20. Emphasises the need for improved tax collection, fighting tax evasion and avoidance and improved tax policy coordination of the measures taken to combat this serious problem, seeking to ensure a geographical overlap between the profits made and the tax collected; takes the view, therefore, that the tax and customs authorities should be provided with sufficient human, material and financial resources to act efficiently and effectively;
Amendment 329 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 21
Paragraph 21
21. Supports all efforts towards improving the quality and growth-friendly character of public expenditure, in particular as regards action to promote universal, free and high-quality education and health systems;
Amendment 332 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 22
Paragraph 22
Amendment 333 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 22
Paragraph 22
22. WelcomNotes the recommendation on the economic policy of the euro area as a way to deepen policy coordination in the follow-up to the Five Presidents’' Report; is deeply worried that democratic influence on euro area economic governance is even further reduced and downward pressure on wages is further increased by the steps outlined in the Five Presidents' Report;
Amendment 344 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 23
Paragraph 23
Amendment 364 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 24
Paragraph 24
24. Welcomes increased attention toRejects the euro area’s aggregate fiscal stance; calls for greater discussion on whether it can be considered broadly neutral given the large investment gap and the attempt made to ensure that this stance is seen through the prism of neutrality, since it believes that this is obstructing the implementation of counter-cyclical policies by the Member States, thus compromising their economic sovereignty even further;
Amendment 371 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 24 a (new)
Paragraph 24 a (new)
24a. Strongly rejects any stance on Member States' fiscal policies at euro- area level or at wider EU level; takes the view that such guidelines, which are profoundly neoliberal, can never be considered impartial or independent, since as economic policy guidelines they necessarily contain within them ideological presuppositions;
Amendment 372 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 24 b (new)
Paragraph 24 b (new)
24b. Points out that EMU and the EU’s economic governance framework, including the European Semester, both conform to the same neo-liberal approach and the same school of mainstream economic thought, and that their apologists are, in other words, attempting to persuade workers and the public that economic decisions are free of ideology and by nature purely technical rather than political; maintains that for all the window dressing, the European economic governance framework will continue to be based on neo-liberal assumptions and principles and imposed on the economic policies of Member States regardless of their constitutions or of the will of the people;
Amendment 373 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 25
Paragraph 25
Amendment 414 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 28
Paragraph 28
28. Recognises the benefits of asymmetrical adjustment, where regaining cith surplus countries taking measures to boost cdompetitiveness doesestic demand, such that deficit countries are not required to undergoing deflation to regain cost competitiveness, which is detrimental to debt sustainability;
Amendment 430 #
Motion for a resolution
Subheading 6
Subheading 6
Amendment 435 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 30
Paragraph 30
30. Believes that better implementation ofthe country-specific recommendations arequires clearly articulated priorities at European level and genuine public debate at national level, leading to greater relevance and ownership a blatant affront to sovereign, democratic decision-taking by the Member States’ peoples and workers concerning the future of their countries;
Amendment 445 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 31
Paragraph 31
31. Calls for striking the right balance between making country-specific recommendations focused on key priorities and ensuring that thTherefore considers it imperative to abolish the European Semester, including the country-specific recommendations, the Alert Mechanism Report, and the Annual Growth Survey, address all key challenges from the perspective ofnd to do away with the six-pack, the two-pack, the Stability and Growth Pact, the Treaty on Stability, Coordination and Governance, and the Europe 2020 targets; strategy;
Amendment 452 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 32
Paragraph 32
Amendment 459 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 33
Paragraph 33
Amendment 462 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 34
Paragraph 34
Amendment 470 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 35
Paragraph 35