INTERVIEW
Emmanuel Macron and Angela Merkel proposed Monday a European recovery plan of 500 billion euros. Via a debt pooling mechanism, this must help the European Union to overcome the economic crisis caused by the coronavirus epidemic. "If it is not completely revolutionary, it is innovative to borrow to transfer money," said Yves Bertoncini, president of the European movement-France, guest of Europe 1 Tuesday.
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New: borrowing to transfer money
If Yves Bertoncini welcomes "a very strong political announcement, especially in a Franco-German framework" and "a very significant advance", he tempers the exceptional side of the Franco-German plan proposed Monday. First of all because the European Union (EU) "already transfers money via its community budget". "France and Germany have been transferring money for decades to the poorest countries," he notes. "At lower levels, Europe has already borrowed money from the European Commission, for example to face the economic and financial crisis in the euro zone," he recalls.
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This stimulus plan therefore has its innovative side in that it combines the two: borrowing and transferring. "We raise money from the common debt at high levels: 500 billion over three years, therefore about 160 billion per year. And instead of lending only this debt - usually we borrow to lend - there, we will borrow to transfer money, "he explains.
"Germany has never refused budgetary solidarity"
Concerning Germany, and the speeches praising the fact that Angela Merkel would have accepted what Germany has always refused, Yves Bertoncini wishes to recall that "Germany has never refused budgetary solidarity". "From the start of European integration, it has transferred tens of billions of euros via the Community budget. Germany has always agreed to finance the CAP or funds which go to regions of Greece or Spain who are in difficulty, "he said.
The president of the European movement-France notes however that Germany "has always refused to go into debt in common at such high levels because it is afraid to sign a blank check to states which are less well managed than it, especially in Southern Europe ". "From this point of view, it is true that Angela Merkel agrees to take a significant step forward to consolidate the functioning of the euro zone and contribute to the revival of the European economy from which Germany will also benefit" , analyzes Yves Bertoncini.
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It remains to convince the 27. If it "never posed a problem for France to transfer money to other countries", for "countries like the Netherlands, which also transfer money each year, Austria, or Denmark, there is a fairly strong reluctance ", he explains. The fact that Germany, a country in the North, and France have agreed beforehand therefore shows that this recovery plan is "necessary and useful". "But we will have to negotiate" so that there is unanimity of the 27, warns Yves Bertoncini.