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What would you advise me to do when there is an elephant in the room, sitting on your lap, and nobody wants to deal with it? This is how I feel when I see EU countries consciously ignoring increasing social divergence in Europe. When I sit in the same room as their representatives, I am waiting for the European Commission and Member States to suggest solutions to the highest levels of inequality, poverty and unemployment that we have seen for decades, yet these solutions never seem to materialise.

Let’s starts with the facts. The five presidents’ report recognises that “today’s divergence creates fragility for the whole Union. We must correct this divergence and embark on a new convergence process”. Mechanisms introduced to ensure that the common currency stays afloat have had a detrimental impact on national budgets: 80% of austerity measures across the EU focused on a reduction of national spending (in particular employment in public administration, social protection and investment).

So, on the one hand Member States want to deepen the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) to stabilise the Eurozone and avoid another Greek, Portuguese, Irish or Spanish crisis. On the other hand they see growing social divergence linked to the EMU but they reject the idea of a joint solution. In reality, social divergence weakens the EMU; so shouldn’t the EU and Member States address it?

Social Platform is in favour for upward social convergence, as mentioned by European Commissioner Marianne Thyssen. We have made concrete proposals for social standards with minimum income, minimum wage, universal access to services and unemployment benefits as key features. Will this be enough to achieve upward convergence? I don’t know, but at least when we see the elephant, we try to find a solution, so that it does not break our knees! We want to engage in a debate with the Commission and Member States to come up with a response to our social challenges. On 30 September the College of Commissioners will finally hold its second orientation debate on social policy. I look forward to hearing their answers to how we respond to social divergence. We cannot allow the situation to worsen. We expect our political leaders to come up with a solution.

Let’s engage,

Pierre Baussand, Director