The European policy of Chancellor Angela Merkel is coming increasingly under pressure. Not only European Commission President Manuel Barroso, but also Enrico Letta, recently asked by Italian President Giorgio Napolitano to form the new governnnent, have criticized her austerity policies, which have been dominant in Europe and are leading to disaster. Europe’s leaders have long been at [...]
Posts Tagged ‘Eurozone’
An open letter to the leaders of Europe: abandon the Euro’s ‘gold fetters’
May 30th, 2012 by Ann Pettifor.On May 15th, in what can only be described as an act of coercion, an impoverished and effectively insolvent Greece acceded to the handover of a bond payment – €436 million – to private financial ‘vulture funds’. The Greeks had little choice. However, in acquiescing to this handover – facilitated by its paymasters,‘the Troika’ – [...]
Hollande’s message for Labour: focus on jobs, growth and an end to austerity
May 7th, 2012 by Michael Meacher.There are several important implications in Hollande’s convincing victory over bling-bling Sarkozy. It’s not just the first Socialist presidential win for 31 years, even more significantly it clearly marks a turning point in European politics, though a lot still depends on how forcefully and skilfully this wedge against the dominant Right is used. But the [...]
Where Europe is going, Britain will follow
Apr 25th, 2012 by Michael Meacher.The 1st round Socialist victory in the French presidential elections on Sunday, the collapse of the Right-wing Dutch government on Monday, the probable demise soon of the Right-wing Czech government , and the likely election on 6 May of an anti-Merkel government in Greece point conclusively in one direction. Across Europe the democratic backlash against [...]
Standing up for Ireland
Mar 15th, 2012 by Gerry Adams.If you want to know who is taking the real decisions about the economy of the Irish state then you need look no further than EU Commissioner Olli Rehn. Since Fianna Fáil crashed the economy and Fine Gael and Labour won last years election they have repeatedly asserted that there can be no deviation from [...]
Another credit crunch looms
Mar 9th, 2012 by Ann Pettifor.The finance sector is signalling alarm, and our politicians are once again asleep at the wheel. Another “credit crunch” may be looming. The most significant evidence emerged from the ECB’s second Long Term Refinancing Operation (LTRO) on Thursday last week. The LTRO is simply language intended to disguise the “printing of money” by the ECB [...]
Austerity Isn’t Working – time to invest in growth and jobs
Feb 28th, 2012 by Lee Brown.Austerity isn’t working. The disastrous Tory economic experiment has left the economy stagnating, household incomes falling at their fastest rate in decades and unemployment soaring towards three million. Even by the criteria the government has set itself, that of reducing the deficit, it is failing. The Tories are set to borrow £158 billion more than [...]
The French goose and the Greek gander
Feb 15th, 2012 by Ann Pettifor.Inside the Eurozone, what’s good for the French democratic Goose it appears, is not necessarily applicable to the Greek democratic gander…. From the Financial Times of 13 February, 2012: Bookmarks Hide Sites
Solidarity campaign to support the people of Greece
Feb 14th, 2012 by Newsdesk.The following appeal for solidarity was today made in a letter to the Guardian. It can be signed here. The people of Greece face an unprecedented economic and political crisis (Violence grips Athens, 13 February). They are being driven to poverty and mass unemployment by the demands of the so-called Troika. Hospitals in Greece are running [...]
Greece: the explosion of a revolution
Feb 9th, 2012 by David Osler.My next scheduled visit to Athens is only four months away, and I guess the city will still look pretty much the way it did last time I was there, its skyline dominated as ever by the Parthenon and the Acropolis. But in social and political terms, Greece is going to feel very different. Such [...]
