Kick-starting investment; changing EFSM; supporting workers and refugees
The Commission agreed on measures to kick-start investment in the real economy. It also proposed changes to the EFSM Regulation to protect non-euro area Member States, highlighted support to redundant workers and discussed migration.
Workers at a lorry assembly line
The European Commission has put the final building blocks in place to kick-start investment in the real economy. A package of measures agreed today will ensure that the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI i) is up and running by early autumn 2015, keeping the ambitious timetable set by President Jean-Claude Juncker i to implement the Investment Plan for Europe. In that context, the Commission has published a Communication on the role of National Promotional banks (NPBs) which have important local expertise and knowledge in cooperation with the European Investment Bank. Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker, Vice-President Jyrki Katainen i and EIB President Werner Hoyer have signed the EFSI agreement setting out the working methods between the Commission and the EIB in the context of Mr Hoyer's visit to the College today. Further decisions include the confirmation of the projects pre-financed by the EIB which will receive the backing of the EFSI guarantee; appointment of the members of EFSI's Steering Board; and final arrangements to launch the European Investment Advisory Hub (EIAH), the European Investment Project Portal (EIPP) and the Scoreboard of indicators for the evaluation of projects.
In the context of the bridge-financing to Greece, the European Commission has proposed changes to the European Financial Stabilisation Mechanism (EFSM) to provide a permanent safeguard for non-euro Member States making sure they will be protected via a system of collaterals in case of possible future uses of the EFSM. The amendments serve to indemnify Member States whose currency is not the euro in case they would incur a financial loss.
A report adopted by the Commission shows that during 2013 and 2014 the European Globalisation Adjustment Fund i (EGF) helped a total of 27 610 workers, who had been dismissed due to the economic crisis and the effects of globalisation, to find new job opportunities. The report shows that, during this period, the EGF provided more than €114.4 million to assist workers in 13 Member States (Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Romania and Spain) in their transition and towards new job opportunities. The EGF funding was matched by another €94.1 million from national resources.
Finally, the College also discussed the state of play of the European agenda for migration following the Justice and Home Affairs Council earlier this week, which made progress towards reaching the proposed numbers of people in need of international protection to be relocated between Member States.
The President also debriefed the College on his official visit to Cyprus last week.
In parallel to the weekly meeting, the European Commission, on behalf of the EU, disbursed a loan of €600 million to Ukraine. This corresponds to the first instalment under the new Macro-Financial Assistance (MFA) programme to support reforms in Ukraine, which amounts to a total of €1.8 billion.