Brussels nervous on public reaction to EU-US trade talks

The EU Commission has discussed with member-states how best to communicate to the public the pending EU-US trade deal called the “Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership.” The meeting was attended by national officials in charge of dealing with

media relations. A paper accompanying the meeting, called “Communicating on TTIP,” obtained by the Danish magazine Notat outlines the EU’s media strategy during the talks.

Formal talks on the agreement began in July, but the scope of the talks and what it could mean for consumers has been the subject of controversy. “The aim is to define, at this early stage in the negotiations, the terms of the debate,” the paper states, “by communicating positively about what the TTIP is about rather than being drawn reactively into defensive communication about what TTIP is not.”

However, the first notes of concern were sounded before the last round of talks held in Brussels earlier this month. A series of consumer groups and NGOs expressed fears that an agreement could water down EU standards on environmental protection and food safety, including genetically modified products. The charge was swiftly rejected by the EU’s chief negotiator, Ignacio Garcia Bercero.

Although the negotiations are held behind closed doors, the Commission says that 350 representatives of NGOs, business and consumer groups met the chief EU and US negotiators for an update on the talks earlier this month. 

EU Commission demands even further austerity

EU countries under market pressures must be prepared to swallow even stronger doses of austerity.

Most states have slashed tens of billions from their public spending plans already, but this may not be enough, according to an annual report from the EU Commission on the state of public finances in member-states.

http://ec.europa.eu/economy_finance/publications/european_economy/2011/pdf/ee-2011-3_en.pdf

The head of the Commission’s economy department, Marco Buti, wrote in a gloomy “editorial” that, “despite the fact that a return of GDP growth, a gradual withdrawal of the temporary support measures and the start of consolidation is starting to reduce deficits, debt is still expected to continue increasing for the next year or so in most cases.

“Once it has reached its peak, the issue is not over. It will not be sufficient to stem the increase; rather, additional consolidation measures will be required to reduce it from its new level .” He argues that Europe’s ageing population will add still further pressures on public finances in the coming decades as a result of the higher costs of ageing and lower growth as a result of the smaller number of people of working age.

Despite multiple rounds of austerity already imposed, Greece for its part will see its debt burden climb to 166.1 per cent of GDP in 2012, up from 157.7 per cent this year, while our own may reach 104 per cent.

The document goes on to say that while governments can reduce debt levels through spending cuts or increasing taxes or a mixture of the two, they should embrace cuts in preference to tax increases, as “evidence from the past shows that cuts have greater success, in terms of the effect that they have on the overall public finances.”

The future in the EU does indeed look gloomy.