I’ll explain how the Sassoli sul Mes capriola is born
After a paper by the Delors think tank in Berlin on the "political impracticability" of the Mes, the president of the EU Parliament, Sassoli (Pd), said: "Today as a country with the Recovery, the loosening of the Pact, Sure and Eurobond will take advantage of of the Mes? Nobody". Liturri's comment also on the sortie of former premier Enrico Letta
In politics, as in life more generally, it is obviously possible to change one's opinion. With one caveat: at least save appearances by trying to apologize if, until a moment before, exactly the opposite was claimed.
But it seems that neither the president of the European Parliament David Sassoli, nor the former prime minister Enrico Letta, have this sensitivity.
Today, the first said, in an interview with Republic, the Mes is "now is anachronistic" and "l 'Europe needs to clear debts for Covid". He then added that “ the Mes is to be reformed. Leaving 400 billion in the freezer would be intolerable. A European Treasury must be created, Recovery bonds must become a definitive model ”. And again: “ Today which country with the Recovery, the loosening of the Pact, Sure and Eurobond will make use of the Mes? Nobody". Therefore, “ to make the Mes useful we need discontinuity: it is necessary to reform it and make it a community instrument, no longer intergovernmental ”.
The second instead commented on Twitter that “ Mes health funds could have been used in my opinion. But states and public opinion do not trust. Take note of this and radically reform everything, transferring those 400 billion to the Commission which can use it well against the recession ”.
We immediately point out to Letta that it is not a question of "trust". We are not at the fruit stand and we are not doubting the ripeness of the tomatoes. Here we are dealing with a tool that has very specific legal constraints, which cannot be canceled with a pat on the back of Gentiloni or Dombrovskis , aimed at ensuring that everything will be fine. It would be time to stop considering ourselves gullible.
Sassoli, on the other hand, is the same one who has made at least a dozen public declarations in favor of the Mes since March, even with rather final tones.
We remember him on April 13 at “Che tempo che fa” unleashing all his confidence stating that “ arguing about Salvastati is useless, it's gone, it's suspended ”. On 6 June he appeared in the newspaper Avvenire declaring that “ the Mes makes available up to 37 billion, an enormous amount for the Italian health system, at 0.1% interest and with maturities of at least ten years. There are no halter or Troika conditions. I am amazed by a debate that is only Italian ”. Still on July 25, he presented the MES as " an unsurpassable opportunity ". And we could go on and on.
What happened to Sassoli? Have you suddenly studied any documents? An activity that would have led him, as we have been doing for months , to conclude that the ESM is an impracticable tool? Difficult, I would say almost impossible.
It happened much more prosaically that on Wednesday 11, a sanctum of the European religion, such as the think tank Jacques Delors in Berlin, published a paper by the deputy director, the jurist Lucas Guttenberg, who acknowledges the "political impracticability" of the Mes as it stands now, he suggests putting aside the reform proposal still under discussion and proposing to reinvent it entirely within the legal perimeter of the EU.
In short, a repositioning order – which is not difficult to identify the political matrix going back to Paris – to which Sassoli docilely and, almost literally, obeyed.
Even more embarrassing the exit on debt cancellation. Sassoli is not a quisque de populo and cannot fail to know that the current purchases of government bonds by the ECB are carried out under a series of conditions that make them compatible, except for raids by the German Court of Karlsruhe, with article 123 of the TFEU. So if you really care – and we have been here for some time in favor of the perpetual detention on the books of the ECB of the securities purchased since 2015 – try to convince Mrs Lagarde first that, on the point she was extremely clear , and then come back with more solid arguments.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/vi-spiego-come-nasce-la-capriola-di-sassoli-sul-mes/ on Sun, 15 Nov 2020 19:36:48 +0000.