Madam President, the report states that the EU is at present in a difficult situation, with sluggish growth, falling profits, lower external demand, reduced confidence among companies and consumers and increased unemployment. Indeed, it is a genuinely disastrous situation, but the question is: what is it due to? I agree with the rapporteur that a new approach to economic policy is required, but what new approach? Neither the Commission nor the rapporteur seems to have a proper answer to that question. Might it have to do with the fact that the very starting point for the analysis has no basis in reality? The report says that economic development is poor in the EU. On average, that is of course no doubt the case, but the fact remains that, beneath that average, the reality varies incredibly from one EU country to another. We are all aware that the situation in Germany is incredibly serious. At the same time, it is by no means as bad in the three EU countries that have chosen to remain outside the eurozone: Great Britain, Denmark and Sweden. In these countries, inflation and unemployment are lower than in the eurozone, and growth is higher. In 2002, growth in the eurozone was 0.9% compared with 1.8% in the three EU countries not participating in economic and monetary union. In Scandinavia, growth is highest in Denmark, the only country which, in a special referendum, said no to EMU. The German financial newspaper, Handelsblatt, also stated the other day that one of the main causes of the German crisis is the exorbitant rate for the euro that makes German exports more expensive. In Sweden, we do not have this type of problem because, fortunately, we still have our own currency, the rate for which varies in relation to other currencies and is thus continually adjusted to the actual situation in the Swedish economy. Another problem for Germany is that, in a depression, it cannot, independently and on the basis of its own needs, decide how large a budget deficit it is to permit for the time being in accordance with normal principles of economic policy. When, as now, it is permitting an increased budget deficit to avoid a total economic disaster, the EU instead threatens to impose a fine upon the country. All this shows that the attempt, via EMU and the euro, to conduct a centrally managed economic policy in 15 different countries has been a failure. The report does not, however, touch upon this. There is the feeling that EMU and the euro have become holy cows that cannot be criticised at all within the EU. When all the facts conspire to indicate that the EU countries should be permitted a greater measure of democratic self-determination, the rapporteur nonetheless chooses to emphasise dogmatically that the Member States are responsible for coordinating economic policy. We now know that a centrally directed bureaucratic economic policy within the EU is a disaster. There are many tasks to which the EU can profitably devote itself, for example those of contributing to peaceful conflict resolution and counteracting cross-border threats to the environment. The experiment involving a compulsory, uniform and standardised economic policy for all the EU countries has proved a failure. This is something I hope the Swedish electorate will remember when, on 14 September, it votes on whether or not Sweden is to exchange the krona for the euro.

Political group: Verts-ALE