I start by congratulating Mr Rosati for a clear and well focussed report that has also the merit of being very much to the point.
However while having this merit, the report might also be overlooking some points which a number of us here consider to be quite important.
We have come to consider country specific recommendations, CSRs, as crucial tools by which to ensure that stability and growth targets are achieved within the Union as a whole.
They are drafted following critical evaluation of economic performance in each and every member state.
Yet CSRs too, and the way by which they are drafted, need to be critically evaluated.
They are tools that are being used in the absence of more organic structures that a deeper economic and monetary union would be able to deploy.
However the agents who propose the recommendations are not necessarily or invariably infallible.
Based at the Commission or wherever, they too can make mistakes.
For instance, they seem to share the oversimplified view that structural reforms have a mechanical and automatic impact on jobs and growth so that, if all countries reform their labour markets at the same time, the extra demand coming from more jobs being created will automatically spill over from one Member State to the next.
To put it differently, alternative policy options to what they propose could quite likely be more effective to stabilize economies and generate growth.
One has to reflect therefore on the effectiveness of past CSRs as well as on the need to carry out social impact assessments of recommendations.
Perhaps too we should have post hoc assessments of the social impact of major CSRs that have been adopted in the past.
Over the past year, I have heard criticisms about the phasing, sequencing and lack of social and political sensitivity related to a number of CSRs.
They could be more than justified.
Just as important is the point that arguably, too many CSRs are applying rigid criteria that do not take into account regional contexts and interconnections.
This leads to another crucial issue.
Though the overall aim is to achieve full economic convergence within the Union, the truth is that instead, divergences are growing and we still lack a comprehensive framework within which to launch policies that counteract both national and regional divergences.
Some of us here do not want at all that economic and monetary union be turned into a transfer union.
But the reality is that we already are in a transfer union – one by which systemically the rules are benefitting certain economies, which happen to be among the stronger.
This is causing a systematic transfer of resources from certain regions to other regions through trade and financial flows.
CSRs cannot be the right tools by which to deal with the problem and we should be aware of this.
The situation in Greece shows us that further political risks could be waiting in the shadows in the other Eurozone countries.
Unless the reduction and elimination of economic divergences are given maximum priority, the effective implementation of CSRs will continue to be problematic.
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