GRTU at the European Parliament Citizens Forum

GRTU participated today to the European Parliament Citizens Forum organised by the European Parliament Office in Malta. GRTU Director General Vincent Farrugia stated that the choice that the European citizens are presented with, by a large section in the media, especially British media, " most unfortunately the choice is between doom and gloom as a future for Europe" stated Vincent Farrugia.

The situation in reality is not as negative as it seems. The answer is gloom only when the problem is not well analysed and a solutions is not available. In the current state of Europe the problem has been analysed and is one of sufficient confidence that motivates markets to buy the sovereign debts of European Governments especially those with macro-economic imbalances, both internal "budget deficits" and external imbalances "economic deficit in the rest of the world". The solution is also identified as the need to provide the money necessary to ensure that all the bonds needed to ensure a return to normality is made available. The practical tools have also been identified.

The euro bond is one obvious solution, but there are other solutions, all more or less a different version of the same. The choice is of tools that will move the funds that are excessive in some countries in Europe and in the rest of the world to those economic areas where the money is most needed. When a problem is analysed and solution is available and the tools to implement the solution are the subject of discussion, then doom should not be a problem.

EU leaders are committed to find the right tools to implement the most practical of solutions. The alternative of the solution being discussed is the breakdown of the monetary union, which should be followed by the breakdown of the economic union. The cost of the breakdown is so excessively large compared to the corrective solutions available that it is obvious that EU leaders will decide in favour of the corrective solutions, as they have committed themselves to do and as they have shown in the implementation of the pro-economic and monetary solutions .

"In my view the predictions of doom and gloom are exaggerated and will not materialise. What is more relevant for us in Malta, and really worth discussing, is the cost of our economy as alternative solutions that are being proposed at EU level" concluded Vincent Farrugia, GRTU's Director General.