Commission offers 'fair and frank' assessment of national reform programmes
As part of its first annual progress report on the relaunched Lisbon strategy for growth and jobs, the Commission has offered what it calls a fair and frank assessment of Member State's national reform programmes (NRPs), emphasising that all have their own strengths and weaknesses. Following the publication of its progress report on 25 January, disappointment was expressed in some quarters that the Commission had not been more robust in its assessment of Member States' reform agendas. The EU executive believes, however, that a policy of 'naming and shaming' the worst performers in Europe's drive for increased competitiveness would be counterproductive at this stage. 'The Commission does not want a Eurovision song contest approach with national programmes ranked in order,' said a statement. 'Naming and shaming can work where we are dealing with simple statistical concepts, such as who has and has not implemented the European laws that they have agreed to, but not here.' The major obstacle to drawing up a league table of the best and worst Lisbon performers is the fact that each EU Member State starts from a different position and faces different challenges, the Commission adds. Nevertheless, it says that it has tried to be 'scrupulously fair and frank in pointing out both strong and weak points in it assessment'. In analysing the reform programme of Austria, which currently holds the EU Presidency, the Commission broadly agrees with the seven priority action areas identified in the document. Particular strengths, according to its assessment, include plans to boost innovation and environmental technologies, and measures to attract and retain more people in employment. While Austria's employment rate of 67.8 per cent is well above the EU average, unemployment increased for the third consecutive year in 2004 to reach 4.8 per cent, hitting young people in particular. On the downside, however, while the Austrian NRP is coherent and realistic in the short term, the Commission says that 'a more ambitious and longer-term approach would have been welcome'. In particular, the Austrian government is encouraged to remove regulatory obstacles to competition in services, and take measures to address the low employment rate of older workers, which, at 29 per cent, is one of the lowest in the EU. Estonia, meanwhile, is praised for its coherent and clearly structured reform programme. 'Objectives are ambitious, with clear paths and detailed measures set out for achieving them,' says the Commission. Research and development (R&D) and employment are the two key challenges identified in the plan, and its strengths include efforts to link environmental sustainability and growth, and a credible effort to introduce information and communication technologies (ICT) in the public sector, which the Commission describes as a good example for other countries to follow. The only areas where it would like to see Estonia focusing more of its efforts are in boosting private R&D investment, improving skills, and linking the measures outlined in the NRP with the upcoming injection of structural funding. Having been ranked as the globe's most competitive economy by the World Economic Forum for the past three years running, Finland could be forgiven for approaching its NRP with the attitude 'if it isn't broken, don't fix it'. However, the Commission says that the Finnish government has set out ambitious yet achievable objectives that build on the country's recent success. Most notably, Finland has set itself the target of raising R&D investment to 4 per cent of GDP by 2010, while the Commission says that the broad stakeholder debate organised to discuss Finland's strategy and the resulting sense of ownership are likely to pay dividends during its implementation. In general, the Commission describes the NRPs as 'very encouraging, a promising sign that the new partnership is already beginning to work', especially as Member States were given very little time to draw them up. 'That said, all can be further improved, some more than others. But, the real test will be how they are implemented,' it concluded.
Countries
Austria, Estonia, Poland