Social Europe package: postponed to 2 July…
(B2) The social package that the European Commission was to present at the end of June has been postponed to July 2 (instead of June 25 as announced for a moment). It still includes a set of communications, including the renewed social agenda, and three directives: on works councils, on discrimination and on cross-border healthcare. These last two proposals are giving rise to intense debate within the Commission and a seminar scheduled for the second half of June should make it possible to see them more clearly.
Write a text about discriminations linked to religions, to sexual orientation is indeed much more complicated and explosive than it seems (how to deal with the question of homosexuals or sects for example). Not writing anything on these subjects is just as problematic! This is all the ambiguity where the Commission is left. Knowing José-Manuel Barroso, we can bet that he will choose the solution that creates the fewest waves. Why not postpone the discussion for example!...
As for the file of "cross-border" care, it is in the same condition as Kyprianou had left it. As long as we are not talking about a text, everyone is in agreement; when snippets of text begin to be presented, the agreement begins to be more dubious. As for gathering all the pieces of text into one, it only arouses adhesion if it is the minimum of the minimum, to the point of saying to oneself: is it really worth it? The choice is, in fact, the same as before: how to make certain countries (certain commissioners) pass the pill, and then to the citizens, how to liberalize the health system, allow private health establishments to equip as they see fit, breaking up the health cards and other obligations put in place by the Member States to keep their health expenditure within a budgetary straightjacket... will be useful for citizens to seek better and cheaper treatment. It is neither more nor less a decoy, at a time when each State - and each citizen - tightens the belt of a notch! Moreover, at the political level, the file still conceals an explosive nature, aggravated by the current political context (period of ratification of the Treaty of Lisbon and elections to the European Parliament...). A real boomerang that risks "fartting in the face" swears a certain expert at the Commission...
