UNICE, (the Union of Industrial and Employers’ Confederation of Europe), is working methodically and at high speed to influence the ongoing Intergovernmental Conference (IGC). With very similar priorities as the ERT, UNICE is making special efforts to prevent that the Treaty revision brings in new elements which might endanger its competitive agenda (especially the Internal Market), such as the integration of environmental and social concerns.
UNICE’s access to key players in the EU is certainly not as free and easy as the symbiotic relationship that has developed between the ERT and high-level decision-makers. Nonetheless, UNICE’s strategies to influence the IGC have reached ears at every possible level of the European decision-making body. For example, a September 1996 letter from UNICE President François Perigot, to John Bruton, the Irish President of the European Council, clarified UNICE’s hopes for the IGC process and asked for a meeting before the October European Council meeting in Dublin. Copies of this letter were sent, among others, to all EU Heads of State, the Commission President, and MEPs.
Such letter writing is only the more visible part of UNICE’s activities. Meanwhile, the more substantial lobbying takes place behind the scenes. “We will make approaches to whoever is presiding over the Intergovernmental Conference”, says UNICE Secretary-General Zygmunt Tyszkiewicz. “At the moment it’s the Dutch. Before that it was the Irish. In the second half of the year it will be the Luxembourg government. We would write to them, but each of our member federations is talking to its own representative to the Intergovernmental Conference on the basis of the policies that we devise here”.1
UNICE’s desires for the IGC are very similar to those of the ERT, but the way each of the two industry lobby groups presents its demands is unique. As is its usual modus operandi, UNICE takes an extremely horizontal approach to influencing the IGC, reacting to every single article or paragraph that could potentially be changed. Says Tyszkiewicz, “The Inter-Governmental Conference affects everybody. Everybody wants to be able to say something about it. It would be bad if they were saying contradictory things, so we have to try and get people together”.2 Thus, UNICE’s position is a compromise of the broad range of industry interests which it represents.
According to UNICE, strengthening Europe’s competitiveness must become an EU objective in the new Treaty. “It is extremely disappointing that up to now, UNICE’s principal policy recommendation to include competitiveness among the objectives of the European Union appears to have been ignored. As a result, the balance between economic and social objectives in the Treaty is at risk of being upset”.3 UNICE also asks for mandatory impact assessments of every proposal and regulation potentially affecting competitiveness.
From the UNICE perspective, these threats to competitiveness include policies for job creation, social security, environment and workers’ rights. The inclusion of an employment chapter in the Treaty makes UNICE more nervous than it does the ERT. UNICE loudly opposes this chapter in its position papers, saying that the Union should instead adopt a social policy which “focuses more on the objective of job creation than on preservation of workers’ rights”.4 Indeed, the mention of workers’ rights sets UNICE on the defensive: “UNICE most strongly opposes inclusion of the Social Charter or of a set of basic social rights in the Treaty, as well as the suggestion that the Union should accede to the European Convention on Human Rights and fundamental freedoms”.5
As a second priority, UNICE asks for action to complete the Internal Market. They propose a new deadline, 1st January 1999, for the liberalization of energy, transport and telecommunications markets and public procurements, the implementation of Trans-European Networks, and the elimination of tax barriers. Again, UNICE is wary of regulations that might slow down the process, and stresses that “all temptations to legalize new trade barriers, inter alia for environmental reasons, should be resisted”.6
Like the ERT, UNICE views the Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries as an enormous market to be conquered by western companies, and as a reservoir of highly skilled and cheap labour. “In the West we have mature markets”, explains Tyszkiewicz. “We are already consuming everything that we’re able to consume. You can’t drive two cars at the same time. So we have a slow growth economy [...] To the East of us, we have around a hundred million people with sophisticated tastes who lack all the items that we are already consuming. They need those items”.7
Although organizations like the ERT and UNICE claim to advocate EU accession by the most advanced CEE countries (Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary), their welcoming arms are open only with the provision that these countries have first reached the appropriate level of development. In practice, this means that these countries must adapt their economic policies to those set by the Union, and at the same time fully open their markets to western goods, services and investments. In other words, countries hoping join the EU must expect to lose control over their own economies.
Finally, UNICE asks for more efficient institutions, which basically means granting more power to the Commission, qualified majority voting in the Council (“so that essential decisions are not delayed”8) and simplifying procedures for the Parliament, “especially as regards co-decision”.9
UNICE is uneasy about the concept of flexibility – allowing the core governments to push ahead with their plans without waiting for countries that are unready or undecided – as it could interfere with the Single Market: “Normally, we would say: well, that’s a constitutional issue, it doesn’t concern us. But in fact, if flexibility is going to be a threat to the proper functioning of the Single Market, then we’re very concerned”.10
Not surprisingly, UNICE strongly supports the request for extending the scope of Article 113 on common commercial policy to issues related to trade in services, intellectual property rights and foreign direct investments.11 These measures would enable industry and the EU to operate more effectively within the trading system set up by the World Trade Organization, and, of course would increase the EU’s global competitiveness.
1. Personal interview with Zygmunt Tyszkiewicz, Brussels, 18 March 1997. |back to text|
2. Ibid. |back to text|
3. François Perigot, letter to Irish President John Bruton, 23 September 1996, p.2. |back to text|
4. UNICE contribution to the Intergovernmental Conference, 15 March 1996, p.1. |back to text|
5. Ibid., p.13. |back to text|
6. Ibid., p.1. |back to text|
7. Personal interview with Zygmunt Tyszkiewicz, Brussels, 18 March 1997. |back to text|
8. UNICE contribution to the Intergovernmental Conference, 15 March 1996, p.4. |back to text|
9. Co-decision is one of the decision making procedures set up in the Maastricht Treaty. With co-decision, the European Parliament can put forward amendments to Council proposals. In case the Council does not agree, it goes back to the Parliament for a second reading. If they stick with the amendments, a conciliation procedure begins and continues for a maximum of three months. This gives the Parliament a kind of veto right. |back to text|
10. Personal interview with Zygmunt Tyszkiewicz, Brussels, 18 March 1997. |back to text|
11. François Perigot, letter to Irish President John Bruton, 23 September 1996, p.6. |back to text|