International

Last week the national Parliament voted in favour of the Netherlands participating in the new EU superfund, the European Stability Mechanism (ESM). Should the Senate do the same, it will be extremely difficult to turn the whole thing around and the Netherlands will be forced to pay out or give guarantees for up to €40 billion. Once again the Europhiles are making a mistake in their thinking. By adopting an accelerated decision-making procedure they sought to avoid ordinary people having the chance to express their views on the ESM via their votes during the coming elections, on the ESM. Such an arrogant attitude guarantees still more scepticism over Europe, as we saw during the SP’s continuing ‘Tour d’Europe’, when it visited the small town of Purmerend, built on land reclaimed from the sea – the ‘polder’ – on Friday. People are extremely concerned about the financial consequences of participation in a fund of this kind, especially at a time where spending cuts are everywhere.

The heads of government wanted such a massive fund in order to pacify the financial markets. They would understand that, however great the problems in the weaker Eurozone countries might be, the richer ones would always stand as guarantor. This would in itself force down interest rates in the weaker countries and in this way the eurocrisis could be brought under control.

The man and woman in the street no longer know what’s going on. How can it be that we in the Netherlands are being destroyed by spending cuts and yet we can afford to deposit €4.6 billion in the ESM? What guarantee is there that we will see any of these billions again? To date it has been shown, moreover, that the financial markets are insatiable. Repeatedly, the funds turn out to be too small to convince the speculators. These speculators aren’t completely wrong, either: in the Eurozone it’s a fact that there are major structural imbalances. The Spanish economy is not the Dutch economy. There is no real long term plan to provide sufficient employment in the weaker Eurozone countries. The European Commission wants to withdraw money from the structural funds and in addition hopes to see wage competition. That at the same time education and health care in these countries have been the victims of imposed spending cuts and because of this the basis of future economic growth has been further weakened – about this the Commission has nothing to say.
The same goes for the fight against corruption and the informal economy. The experts who were sent to Greece by the Commission to help repair tax collection are fairly desperate about the situation. This won’t be changed in a single year. For that you need a long-term plan.

In short, whether the ESM will turn out to be an effective weapon against the speculators is at least open to question. There is a real chance of failure and of being asked for additional deposits. The people in Purmerend who were concerned about the ESM have understood things better than the majority in Parliament. It would have been good for democracy in the Netherlands if these people, just like all other Dutch citizens, had been given the chance to state their views on the ESM in the parliamentary elections to be held in the near future. The government has fallen, and when a government has fallen it is generally recognised that only non-controversial matters should be subject to new laws. This was, believe it or not, defined as ‘non-controversial’, and the superfund forced through. A proper debate about the ESM and the eurocrisis belongs in the parliamentary election debates. The SP has the task of ensuring that this subject continues to be discussed. And after the elections we will be able to look into the extent to which this fund can yet be undone.