International

The most right-wing Commission ever will have to win approval from the European Parliament today without the support of the SP, which from the beginning has judged it too neoliberal, as SP European Parliament group leader Dennis de Jong explains. "Of course you have to be realistic," he concedes, "but that the European Commission consists of people who see the free market not as the cause of the crisis, but as the solution to it, gives us a glimpse of the deep gulf which lies between Brussels and the public."

The social democrats support the new Commission, with their leader Martin Schulz stating in his declaration that this was based on the promise that every new legislative proposal would be assessed for its likely social consequences. De Jong finds this worrying, wondering if "it means that the social democrats on the basis of this promise will drop their support for the European trade unions' demand for a legally binding social progress clause? All this amounts to is so much proof of the social democrats' weak-kneed approach. In the European Parliament election campaign they shouted their support for such a clause from the rooftops, but now you never hear a thing about it."

During the different Commissioners' hearings which took place last month, it became obvious to the SP that no social progress would be made under this Commission, that Europe would not become more humane. The new Commission does not have the courage to break with market fundamentalism. This morning Commission President Barroso described the internal market as the precondition for the European project. In turn, De Jong describes the Commission's start as "a missed chance to win Europe back from the big corporations and for ordinary citizens".