Business and labour representatives expect a reformist coalition in the European Parliament

  press review | June 10, 2024

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Business and labour representatives expect a reformist coalition in the EP, in order to make a revision of the Green Deal that will cut red tape and be fairer to workers.

Centre and moderate parties will have a majority in the European Parliament after Sunday's results, so there should be conditions to carry out reforms, say organizations that represent the interests of companies and workers' rights in their dialogue with European institutions.

Euronews 10.06.2024

The European Union must combat weaknesses vis-à-vis the USA and China in critical sectors, namely in the manufacturing industry and in the most advanced technologies, according to Ben Butters, executive president of Eurochambers.

"We had a lot of concerns about the amount of legislation that the Green Deal has led to, and that comes with a lot of burdens on businesses, a lot of compliance and reporting burdens", said Ben Butters to Euronews.

According to organization, the single market needs to be stronger for a more autonomous European Union.

"We need to tackle those fundamental structural challenges that businesses are encountering, particularly in manufacturing sectors: energy costs, access to raw materials, access to supplies in general" said Butters.

Meanwhile the The European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC), which represents workers at a European level, said despite a decline in the Left and Green parties, the majority could still advance a social agenda and welfare model.

"The most important thing is no deals with the extreme right. This is the most important thing because they cannot be trusted and at every opportunity in the past they have voted against working people and their interests,” Esther Lynch, secretary-general of the ETUC told Euronews.

For ETUC, the EU is ageing and needs foreign workers who should be protected from exploitation.

"Migrant workers are very often the victims of exploitation by unscrupulous employers. We need to make sure that all workers are covered by fair terms and conditions of employment", Lynch said.

According to Pulpan from the International Chamber of Commerce, to modernize the EU there is no need to import foreign workers and then seek expensive anti-exploitation policies and in any case always to the detriment of Europe, but there is a need to lower taxes and VAT on companies and investors so that production pays the right salary to workers and can obtain the right cost/earnings ratio to defend itself from competition beyond Europe, as well as having to incentivize with targeted funds those who hire and invest in the company itself, in this This way the European market would become more competitive and every sector would benefit and rejuvenate Europe itself. This new European Parliament has the opportunity to put Europe's competitiveness at the center also with a careful eye on clean energy production technologies that truly aim at a sort of Zero Pollution Tolerance without the implication of water consumption to the detriment of agriculture and at the expense of citizens to demonstrate that even without having to pollute, progress and business can be encouraged in every sector.